By Lyndx
lydx@angelfire.com
 

Distribution: Ephemeral, Gossamer etc. Sure. Anywhere else is okay too as long as my name stays attached and you mail me at lydx@angelfire.com to let me know.
Classification: WIP!
Rating: R for violence and a couple of swear words
Keywords: Angst / ScullyTorture/MulderAngst/KrycekAngst
Spoilers: through season 7
Summary: originally inspired by a challenge on SKipperfic
Feedback: is food for the soul, so please take a moment to tell me what you think
Disclaimer: They're not mine, duh. They belong to CC, the creator and most especially to GA and DD and the rest of the crew who breathe life into them.
Heartfelt thanks to Julie, for volunteering to beta read, for gentle nudges and for lots of comma's in all the right places.  
 

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

CHAPTER 1

"They have her." The voice on the other end of the line was
familiar, but Mulder's sleep addled brain couldn't put a face
to it.

The message came through loud and clear though, and he shot
upright in his bed. Putting the horn on his shoulder he grabbed
his cell phone, hit speed dial 1 and listened to her phone ring
over and over while silently begging for her to pick up.
Finally her voice came on line and he breathed a sight of
relief and began apologizing for waking her up so late. It took
him a moment to realize it was her machine picking up.

"Scully, it's me," he said. The words used as an opening to a
hundred different conversations between them, ranging from the
mundane to the extraordinary, rolled off his tongue with easy
familiarity, belying the panic that was starting to churn in
his gut now.

"Scully, if you're there please pick up."

He waited a beat and then repeated his plea, his rising panic
clear in his voice even to his own ears. "Scully, please pick
up..."

Nothing...

He disconnected and tried her cell phone instead. It too rang
and rang until her voicemail kicked in. He threw the cell phone
on the bed then started pulling his clothes on in a frantic
rush. His overactive imagination served up images of Duane
Barry, Donald Pfaster and too many other monsters, human or
otherwise, all out to steal her from him. He found himself
trying to pull on his socks and ripping through the sole in his
rush to get dressed and forced himself to take a deep breath,
steadying the pulse pounding in his temples like the bass line
in some hardcore rave whatever club mix.

Easy does it, he told himself, there could be a million reasons
why she didn't answer the phone just now. Maybe she went out to
run an errand or to visit her mother, or maybe she's taking a
long soak or doing laundry down in the laundry room, or perhaps
she's listening to some music with her headphones on and the
volume turned up really, really loud. The thought did nothing
to reassure him, though. He knew her and he knew her habits.
She should have been either asleep in her bed or lounging on
the couch, home at any rate and near the phone.

They'd just this evening flown in from a case in Florida, and
she'd barely been able to keep her eyes open during the ride
from the airport to her apartment, where he'd dropped her off
only 3 hours ago. She would have stumbled in, taken a long
bath, maybe drinking a little wine while soaking, and gone to
bed. By all rights she should have answered the phone, groggy
from sleep and once woken up sufficiently she should have
quickly started chewing him out for disturbing her much needed
rest.

This silence on the other end of the line spelled trouble as
surely as a bag left unattended in the London Underground
during his Oxford days did.

He grabbed a T-shirt from a drawer and stepped into the nearest
pair of pants, his jeans fortunately, left abandoned at the
foot of his bed Sunday a week ago when they'd left for Florida
without any forewarning, as per usual. He pulled on his shoes,
fumbling with the laces like a kid who's only just learned to
tie them by himself and startled when he heard his name
emanating from the bedroom phone, only now realizing he'd
abandoned it on his pillow somewhere down the line without
disconnecting. He grabbed the phone, and to his horror it
immediately started to slip from his sweaty grasp.

The sadistic little screenwriter in his head served up a scene
in which it fell and shattered on the ground, severing his only
connection to whoever was on the other end of the line that
held knowledge as to what had happened to his partner. He
tightened his grip in time to prevent that disastrous scenario
from playing itself out and told himself to take it easy. If
Scully had been taken, this person was his only link to finding
out what had happened to her, he needed to keep a cool head.

"Hello?" he said carefully, keeping his voice even. The effort
it took to keep in control was making him tremble. He was
answered by a short burst of mirth on the other end, it was the
same voice, the dry quality of the chuckle familiar;
recognition hovered right on the edge where memory became
tangible.

"Who the hell is this?" he asked, his voice sounding strangled
even to his own ears.

"Why Agent Mulder, how easily you forget. I'm crushed."

"Krycek!" Mulder couldn't believe how slow-witted he'd been; he
should have recognized the bastard's voice the moment he'd
uttered his first syllable. "Krycek, you son of a bitch! If you
hurt her, so help me I'll..."

"Save it Mulder," Krycek said and the urgency in his tone drew
Mulder up short and made him pay attention to what the other
man was saying. "They have her and we need to get her back.
Now!"

"Who has her, Smoking Man?" Mulder asked, feeling anger rise
like a tidal wave. "Is he up to his old tricks again? Where
have they taken her?"

"I'll fill you in when..." Krycek started to say but Mulder cut
him off.

"Fill me in now!" The tidal wave was steadily growing and he
knew that if he allowed it to crash it would sweep away
everything in its path. Pounding his fist into the pillow
resting innocently against the headboard he drew in a cleansing
breath and slowly expelled it. "Where is she?"

"Be ready in 5 minutes..."

The line went dead and Mulder threw the phone down and tried
her number once more. Again her machine answered and at the
sound of her voice an angry sob tore from his throat.

Her cell phone yielded the same result.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

Scully woke up to a splitting headache and a foul taste in her
mouth and forced herself not to move, to keep her eyes closed.
There was no slow transition, no gradual realization that she
had not woken up in any place familiar, no shift from
comforting insensibility to disconcerting awareness; she knew
what had happened and where she was from too many instances
where the same thing had happened.

Lifted from her bed and now in the hands of some madman or men
hell-bent for some reason to do God knows what to her. The
circumstances varied but the basics remained the same.

At least you're not a novice at this, she grimly told herself,
you must have learned something from all those other times the
same damned thing happened, use it to get yourself out of this
mess.

She kept her breathing even, in an effort to let her captor or
captors think she was still unconscious, and tried to take
stock of her situation. Her arms were angled in an
uncomfortable position behind her back, her wrists hurt and
there was a familiar tingling in her fingers. A careful,
stealthy movement confirmed that she was bound, hand and foot.
The sluggishness with which her brain had come to that
conclusion, she realized, spoke of the lingering effects of
some sedative. Hard on the heels of that thought she identified
a sharp stinging in her shoulder which must be the location
where they'd shot her, presumably with a tranquilizer dart.

She remembered the sight of a gun as she'd struggled up from
sleep. Remembered diving for her own gun in a reflex so
ingrained that she had not even been fully awake yet while
executing the maneuver. A glancing blow to her head had
deflected her dive and a boot to the stomach later she'd found
herself on the ground, gasping for breath and looking into the
barrel of the gun once more. She remembered a quick prayer,
"Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name...forgive us
our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us..."
A sharp sound, like a balloon popping but softer, and then pain
bloomed in her shoulder. There was a moment of utter surprise
at the stark realization she'd been shot and next, nothing but
darkness until waking up cold, sore, and trussed up like a
turkey the night before Thanksgiving dinner.

Straining her ears, Scully tried to make out any sound that
would tell her she had company but total silence reigned and
she relaxed slightly and comforted herself with the thought
that that must mean that for the moment she was in no immediate
danger. Best not to let your guard down though, she thought,
they might well be in the room and keeping still, trying to
lull you into a false sense of security.

Still keeping her breathing even, Scully opened her eyes ever
so slightly and, peeking through her lashes, tried to get a
view of her surroundings. She was greeted by darkness, thick
and impenetrable and a momentary feeling of panic gripped her
at the thought of being trapped down here, wherever the hell
'down here' was, buried alive in some coffin, deep underground
with no way out and no one knowing where to look. Her mind
conjured up images of herself, wasting away from lack of food
and water, slowly suffocating, trying to dig her way out with
only her finger for tools, and she violently pushed the
thoughts away.

Don't go panicking just yet, she told herself sternly, scope
out the terrain first, things may not be as bad as all that.
You're obviously not buried alive in any coffin, there's space
all around you and air, blowing in from somewhere, chilly but
dry and familiar smelling.

She sniffed, the air smelled of something faintly chemical, an
unpleasant smell she'd encountered before. Some abandoned
factory or warehouse then, she decided. It would be wouldn't
it; that's after all where they seemed to wind up at the end of
more cases than she cared to remember.

Time and again they had found themselves at the edge of
discovering that elusive, mythical, truth Mulder was always
chasing after. They'd found it hid in the most unexpected of
places; a deserted laboratory, an abandoned leper colony, a box
car, a hospital room, a hallway, beneath an endless expanse of
ice, on a stretch of beach in West Africa -- and above all in
countless warehouses.

But wherever they had followed it, time and again their prize
had been snatched from them. She was sick and tired of ending
up in these helpless situations, all for a truth that so
diligently fought their every attempt to uncover it, a quest
that was not even hers to begin with. She'd stumbled into it
when she'd walked into Mulder's basement and it had swallowed
her whole, taken her career, her health, her sister, her
daughter. Maybe she should leave well enough alone, before it
finally took her life, try to convince Mulder to do the same.
From her perspective, it was pretty clear the truth didn't want
to be found.

First order of business then, was to get herself out of her
current predicament, or her resolve wouldn't mean a whole hell
of a lot. Feeling relatively certain that she was alone in the
room or basement or wherever the hell she was she slowly sat up
straight, wincing a bit at the discomfort radiating from her
bruised stomach, and set about trying to find a way out of the
mess she had landed in.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

Barreling out the front door of his apartment, Mulder almost
collided with his sworn enemy and had his fist planted in
Krycek's face before the other man had even had a chance to say
anything.

"You son of a bitch," he shouted. "Where is she? Tell me now or
so help me..."

His gun was out and aiming between Krycek's eyes, the tsunami
in his head gathering force, threatening to break.

"I told you we don't have time for this, you idiot," Krycek
said. The smooth voice grated on his nerves and Mulder jerked
Krycek to his feet and slammed him up against the wall pressing
his gun into the man's neck with enough force to bruise.

"Let go of me and I'll tell you what I know. Her life depends
on us, we need to move now!"

Mulder took a step back, his aim never wavering.

"What the hell's your game, Krycek? Why are you here offering
me your help, huh? " He was red-faced with anger and
desperately wanted to be able to vent his anger at Krycek the
way he had unscrupulously done in the past. But it was Scully's
life in danger now and apparently this slime-bag was his only
hope of finding out what was going on, and, more importantly,
where she was. This wasn't the time to give into his compulsion
to beat the crap out of the double-dealing bastard. Restraint
was called for.

Krycek pushed the gun to the side with his artificial limb,
never once blinking or taking his eyes off Mulder's face,
judging him and apparently finding him lacking. He left his
hand where it was, lightly resting on Mulder's arm. The
perfectly molded plastic gleamed lifelessly in the glow of the
streetlights as he started to massage his jaw with his whole
one, observing Mulder with an odd look in his eyes.

"I know you hate me and would just as soon see me dead," he
said slowly. "I'm not here to help YOU, I'm here to help HER.
Maybe I care whether she lives or dies..."

"Why?"

"Maybe because I feel I owe her. After all she saved my life
once by shooting you. Maybe I figured it's time to repay the
debt. Maybe I'm hot for her, does it matter?"

"So why come to me at all, why not go be a hero on your own?"
Mulder asked, ignoring the last remark, his voice tight with
the effort it took to restrain himself. He was more than a
little suspicious at this show of concern from a man who, in
all the years he'd known him, had never shown any sign of pity
or remorse over any of the various atrocities he'd committed to
further the Project or benefit his own agenda.

"Because I have a sneaking suspicion that trying to find and
rescue her on my own would most likely get me killed right
alongside her," Krycek said. He was now leaning against the
wall he'd been slammed into just moments ago, posture relaxed,
a confident smile on his face.

Apparently sure now of the way this was going to go down, he
looked to be utterly unconcerned for his own safety and a
little bit bored.

Mulder took all this in while he weighed the pros and cons of
striking up an alliance with his sworn enemy. He realized he
was caught between the proverbial rock and hard place. The
thought of working closely with Krycek was repulsive, and he
knew the man never did anything without it ultimately
benefiting himself. He knew no honor and would just as easily
stab him in the back if push came to shove. On the other hand,
he claimed to have information on what had happened to Scully.

Ultimately there was no decision to make.

"So start talking."

"I knew you'd come around eventually," Krycek said. His grin
got a little wider and a little more predatory and for a moment
all Mulder desperately wanted to be able to do was backpedal,
so certain was he that he'd made a big mistake that would get
him killed. He shook the thought and concentrated on what
Krycek was telling him.

"Agent Scully was taken from her apartment an hour ago by
erstwhile associates of Mr. Cobra. I think you're aware of this
now deceased former DOD employee?"

"He was supposed to give her information on a shadow project
for advanced research he was working on," Mulder said. His face
darkened at the memory of Scully's shame and disappointment at
having been duped by the Smoker. He'd lured her with false
promises of a cure for not just cancer but the holiest of
grails, the cure for all human disease, knowing that she
wouldn't be able to resist going after something so precious
and close to her heart. "Cancer Man switched the disk Cobra
gave her for an empty one and kept the original himself."

Krycek nodded. His breath plumed in the chilly night air and
observing him as if through a wreath of smoke, Mulder couldn't
shake the image of the Smoker's craggy features overlaying the
smooth panes of Krycek's inscrutable face.

"That's what he wanted her to think," Krycek said. "In fact he
did use the disk for his own purposes, but it seems he decided
she should have the research eventually." He pushed away from
the wall and started for the street towards an unassuming dark
green sedan parked at the curb. Glancing over his shoulder to
make sure Mulder was following; he picked up his pace and
started digging in his pockets for his keys.

"He made a copy and secreted it away in her CD collection--
disguised it as an audio disk. He figured he would let her know
in his own time that the information was hers to do with as she
saw fit." Krycek's tone held a note of wonder. "Who knew the
old man would have it in him, huh? To be able to grow a heart
after all he's done. I'd say your partner has an amazing effect
on all of us."

"What's your connection to all of this," Mulder choked out,
reeling at the implications of what Krycek had just told him.
His heart was pounding in his chest like a bongo player gone
mad and he felt his knees grow weak.

"Spender warned me they'd try to take her. They came for the
original, which he's since destroyed. They figured he might
have made copies and beat him within an inch of his life." A
feral smile and he continued, "He finally caved in and told
them she has the copy."

"Not so much heart there after all," Mulder said, fuming at the
Smoker's duplicity and scared shitless at the thought of Scully
in the hands of such ruthless criminals. "So these are the guys
that took Scully," he whispered more to himself.

His words sounded frantic and utterly lost to his own ears.

At Krycek's affirmative nod fear reached out with cold sharps
fingers and clutched at Mulder's heart. The sensation was like
nothing else he had ever felt, crushing terror rivaled only by
the singular dread he had felt when his sister was taken away
from him when he was twelve and there was nothing he could do
about it.

Please hold on Scully, it was all he could do to not let his
imagination get the better of him as his mind conjured up
images of her, battered and bruised after meeting up with
Pfaster...twice. Her head on a chopping block at Chaco;
walking towards him on a bridge in Bethesda, blood smeared all
over her face; the picture he had of her in the trunk of
Barry's car, bound and gagged and looking terrified.

Scully hold on, please. He slumped down to his knees, the
mantra circling around in his brain like a CD set on endless
repeat, holdonholdonholdonholdonholdon...

Unable to breathe he found himself hyperventilating, just this
side of losing consciousness altogether and for an interminable
moment bleak despair overwhelmed him.

Krycek's voice, equal parts impatience and derision mixed in
now with his hitherto bland delivery, stopped the downward
spiral and roused him to awareness.

"Are you going to wallow in guilt and self pity," he said, "or
are you gonna do something about it, Mulder? It's up to you,
I'm going after her whether you're coming or not."

Shame at being chided by his worst enemy wiped the last
vestiges of guilt and terror from his brain and helped him
focus on his unusual ally.

"So where is she, where do we start?"

"That I don't know. I went by her apartment and got there only
moments too late. I got a partial number plate, but that's
all," A look Mulder was startled to realize was regret flitted
over the other man's features. "Her place is a mess," Krycek
finished.

"Seeing as they took her, I guess they didn't find what they
were looking for," Mulder said. "So do you know what they were
looking for?"

"CD by a guy named Moby, some kind of new age guru. It wasn't
there."

Mulder blanched, then spun on his heels and raced back up to
his apartment, Krycek hot on his heels.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

CHAPTER 2

Hours later she found herself back where she'd started, leaning
against the wall. Her fruitless efforts, attempting to get out
of her bonds and crawling around the floor trying to find a way
out, had left her sore, exhausted and more than a little
frustrated.

Her attempts to escape her bonds had chafed her wrists bloody
and raw, and crawling around the floor had revealed little
except that the room she was in wasn't all that big. It was
totally devoid of furniture, except for a heavy metal table and
two equally heavy wooden chairs taking up space in the middle.
It did indeed appear to be a basement, and there was only one
exit, located at the top of a rather rickety flight of stairs.
In her bound state it had taken her an hour and a half to get
to the top of the stairs and confirm that the door was indeed
locked. Another thirty minutes and a fresh set of bruises later
she found herself back on the basement floor in the same spot
she had started from.

Not willing to give up, she had made one more circuit around
the room but the futile effort only served to convince her that
there was nothing more to learn.

Then, finally, deciding enough was enough, Scully had let
herself slump back against the wall and close her eyes, a
futile action in and of itself but at least with her eyes shut
she could pretend she had a choice in seeing nothing.

The silence had gone from comforting to oppressive, and the
total absence of light was starting to unnerve her. Where at
first she had been able to keep thoughts of being buried alive
and lost forever at bay, her vivid imagination now increasingly
ran away with her.

Shouldn't let yourself be influenced by all those late night
horror movies, she chided herself. Remember what you told
Mulder about the tricks that the mind plays. Ingrained clich's
evoking irrational responses and all that crap, this fits the
bill admirably, wouldn't you say.

At the thought of Mulder her spirits rose. She knew that the
minute he found out she was missing he would put all his
considerable investigative talents and powers of persuasion to
work towards achieving one objective: locating and rescuing
her.

She could picture him rushing to-and-fro, frantic thoughts of
cancer and coma and three months lost running through his mind,
but outwardly as cool, calm and collected as he ever was. His
panic face to others would be indistinguishable from the
emotionless mask he habitually wore to work every day. His
voice a monotone drone only she knew well enough to distinguish
the many nuances of.

All the while though, he'd spare no resources, would move
heaven and earth and use every means at his disposal in order
to find her as quickly as possible, as he'd done for her in the
past; as they'd both done for each other.

There was no doubt in her mind he'd find her; in the meantime
her goal would be to stay alive long enough for him to achieve
his objective.

To that end she forced herself to relax. There was nothing more
she could do until her captor or captors announced their
presence and divulged their intentions, until that happened,
she needed to get some rest and conserve her strength.

She wouldn't waste time berating herself for once more being
the damsel in distress either; he'd played the part himself on
more than one occasion.

The thought made her smile; they were even on that score, the
weight of being rescuer and rescued evenly distributed.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

Mulder rushed into his building, skidding to a halt in front of
the elevator. He glanced up to see it was still on its way down
and instead rushed up the stairs three steps at a time, Krycek
following at a more leisurely pace. He threw open his front
door and absently heard it slam into the wall and bounce back.
Throwing an uncaring glance over his shoulder, he found there
was now a dent in the wall where the doorknob had hit. Plaster
was slowly sifting down.

He reached his desk, began rifling through the files, books,
newspaper clippings and assorted other junk cluttering the
surface and found what he was looking for just as he heard
Krycek enter behind him.

Mulder grabbed the innocuous-looking jewel case he'd unearthed
from his desk and shoved it in Krycek's direction, noting the
way the other man's flat green eyes narrowed at the sight of
the brightly colored cover showing an off-center picture of a
man mid-jump.

"Is this it?" he asked. "Is this what they took her for?"

"Only one way to find out, I guess."

Mulder whirled around and started booting up his computer, all
the while keeping an uneasy eye on Krycek and wondering what
his game was.

The computer whirred into life with a sound like a car
backfiring then began to chug through its start-up routine.
Must get that fan replaced soon, he thought irrelevantly as he
watched the start-up screens scroll past.

Realizing his fingers were drumming an impatient tattoo on the
tabletop he forced himself to still his nervous actions, to
slip on a non-committal mask in an attempt to not let Krycek
know the extent to which Scully's disappearance had shaken him.
Then again, the guy had been there when she disappeared the
first time and had seen him lose it oh so badly way back then.
If anyone would know how this was affecting him it would be the
man standing in his doorway. Scully had been by his side only
briefly that first time and he'd been frantic. Now years deeper
into the game, frantic didn't begin to describe it. She was all
that he had and vice-versa. Mulder suspected Krycek had already
grasped that little detail and sadly found himself
acknowledging the fact that none of their enemies seemed to
have overlooked it, even as he and Scully sometimes had.

Mulder gave up on his pretense and resumed his impatient
drumming as the computer finished its start-up routine. As soon
as his desktop appeared, an exact copy of the poster on his
office wall, he began to frantically tap keys in an effort to
crack the disk and get a look at the data that was supposed to
be on there. His limited computer skills proved to be
ineffectual though, and he soon gave up, knowing he was wasting
valuable time. Retrieving the disk from the CD-ROM drive he
made for the door without bothering to shut down.

Krycek followed without comment and Mulder had to repress the
urge to plant his fist in the bastard's impassive face.
Instead, making his way down the stairs, since the elevator had
predictably disappeared on him again, he whipped out his cell
phone and pressed speed dial 2.

A tinny voice answered with a gruff hello and he couldn't
suppress a small smile when a series of clicks and whirrs told
him they were on full alert despite the late hour.

"Frohike, it's me."

"Would that it were the delectable Agent Scully addressing me
thus, but alas, 'tis her lanky partner."

Impatient with the lecherous antics of the smallest of the
Gunmen, which usually amused him, Mulder cut in rudely.

"Hike, shut up," he said. "I need your help. Turn the tape
recorder off."

He was gratified to hear a click as the recorder was switched
off and then Frohike's voice filtered through. "What's up,
Mulder," he asked. He sounded worried.

"Scully's in trouble, I'm coming over."

He heard Frohike sit up straight and mentally saw him waving
his cronies over. Thank God for you guys, he thought
gratefully, maybe my earlier estimation was slightly off; it's
not just Mulder and Scully against the world after all, huh?

"What do you need," Frohike asked. The brisk, businesslike
efficiency of the inquiry did nothing to disguise the deep
anxiety in his voice.

"For now I need you to trace a partial plate for me," Mulder
said. Glancing back over his shoulder, he cocked an eyebrow and
Krycek supplied him with what information he had, which Mulder
relayed to the Gunman.

"Got it," Frohike said. In the background Mulder could hear
Byers repeating the information and then the sound of a
keyboard being attacked with fervor filtered through.

"What's your ETA, Mulder?"

"Twice as fast as usual," he replied. "Just get on it please,
Hike."

"Doing it as we speak, just get here, my man."

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

Scully had actually all but fallen asleep when a metallic voice
loudly calling her name startled her into wakefulness. With the
sudden sound light flooded the room and she blinked tears from
her eyes at the overwhelming influx of visual and auditory
information after having been deprived of both for so many
hours.

"Let me go," she said, feeling rather proud of the low and
steady quality of her voice. Practice and more practice, she
thought wryly, another few times kidnapped and held hostage and
you'll have that fearless-while-helplessly-
bound-and-up-against-overwhelming-odds thing down pat.

Relegating that sarcastic inner voice to the back of her mind,
Scully forced herself to pay attention to the disembodied
voice.

"No can do, Agent Scully, not until you answer some questions."
A female voice. Cultured and with a faint accent Scully was not
immediately able to place.

"Who are you?" she asked, feeling irrationally proud of how
steady her voice sounded.

"Let me ask the questions, Agent Scully," the voice chided. "I
think that's only appropriate, don't you, since you are our
guest."

"What do you want from me?" she asked, ignoring the last
remark.

"Some answers," A hint of humor. "It's simple, really. We want
answers. You give them to us. We let you go. Everyone ends up
happy."

Southern, she was sure the accent originated somewhere in one
of the Southern States.

"And if I don't?"

"The only one who ends up happy is my friend Python, who will
get to practice what he loves best."

"Which is?" Scully asked, fearing she knew the answer already.

"The Art of Persuasion."

"I see," Scully said. Her voice was still even and revealed
nothing of the fear churning in her gut. Her face was similarly
a blank mask, betraying nothing. The only sign of unease was
the restless back and forth movement of her thumbs over the
pads of her fingers. With her hands still bound behind her back
the tiny movements were obscured from her captors' eyes and her
outward image of strength and poise remained intact, a fact for
which she was irrationally grateful.

Inwardly though, she felt panic taking hold.

This was bad; she'd been relying on her previous experiences
being taken by madmen with one or more screws loose. She'd
learned from them and from working with Mulder and was
reasonably sure she would be able to put together a serviceable
profile and keep herself alive until help came, or until she
was able to create an opening and get the upper hand herself.

She'd not counted on being held captive by what was fast
becoming obvious were cold-blooded professionals, out for
information and more than likely not easily distracted from
achieving their objective.

"So what is it you want to know?"

"The disk Cobra gave you, where is it?"

"What disk?" thoughts of her road trip with the Smoker and the
way he had duped her immediately surfaced.

"Don't play games, Agent Scully," a flicker of impatience and
then the voice smoothed out again, "and don't play dumb either.
Let's not make this any more unpleasant than it has to be."

Scully's brain was frantically scrambling to come up with a
means to negotiate her way out of this, but it was hard talking
to a disembodied voice.

"I don't understand. I don't..."

"Oh, yes you do," the voice cut her off mid sentence, angry now
and with it the accent became noticeably thicker, the cultured
veneer thinner. "Now quit stalling and tell me where you hid
the disk!"

"I'm not stalling," she said. "I'm just having a hard time
figuring out what it is you want to know." Despite the helpless
state she was in, she felt anger rise like the sea under the
pull of the moon and welcomed it. Better anger than the fear
that had clutched at her heart with cold sharp fingers moments
before. "Whatever it is, I suggest you let me go. Maybe we can
forget this ever happened."

"Agent Scully, you are in no position to make demands. Now for
the last time, tell me what I want to know or I'll be forced to
take steps. My friend Mr. Python is already on his way down and
I suggest you share with me before he gets there."

The threat was clear, and her options limited. Better be
honest, she told herself, nothing to lose anyway, no top secret
info on that damned disk, no cure for cancer or any other
disease for that matter, no eternal life, nada, zip, zilch.

"I threw it away, the disk was empty."

"Don't lie to me, you bitch!"  Mississippi, her mind
irrationally supplied, or maybe Alabama. "Tell me what I want
to know!"

"I already did, the disk was empty, there is nothing more to
tell."

Silence for a long time and Scully used the reprieve to take in
her surroundings, now that her eyes had become accustomed to
the light. As she'd already ascertained during her laborious
crawl across the floor earlier, there was nothing much there.
Whitewashed walls were added to her inventory, as were multi
colored pipes running up through the ceilings in a confusing
pattern and two banks of fluorescent lighting, spaced evenly
across the expanse of the ceiling. One of the neon tubes had
already given up the ghost; a second was not far behind,
flickering intermittently.

Just when she was relatively certain the woman had left, the
sudden snick of a deadbolt being thrown filtered down, followed
by the creak of a door opening. Looking up, all Scully saw was
the tall, elegant silhouette of a woman standing in the
doorway.

"I see the way this is gonna go, and I'm sorry it has to turn
out like this."

Descending the stairs, the woman's features gradually emerged
from the shadows and Scully took in her appearance at a glance;
female, Caucasian, about 5'8", blond hair, green eyes, about
120/130 pounds, no distinguishing marks, mentally composing a
picture as if for her case report.

Way to go, now get a sketch artist in and maybe we can get a
picture to accompany that rather concise and by the book
description, Agent Scully.

The woman was holding a syringe in her hand and when she
stopped next to Scully's bound form, her purpose was clear.

"You don't have to do this," Scully said, her voice still
controlled but her eyes involuntarily widening, gaze glued to
the syringe, which was filled with a clear substance that
looked somehow poisonous in the harsh shine of the fluorescent
lights. "I told you there was nothing on it."

The woman crouched down, depressing the plunger a bit to get
the air out. A few tiny drops appeared, catching the overhead
light, and rolled down the smooth unforgiving surface of the
needle.

"Oh, but there was," she said. A smile flitted over her face
but never reached her cold green eyes. "That's why he returned
it to you, later, after he was done with it. Now where is it?"

"I don't know what the hell you mean!" Burrowing into the wall
to get away from the needle, Scully locked eyes with the woman
and made no effort to suppress her shudders. She'd never been
afraid of needles up until a few years ago, but now if nothing
else her half remembered experiences during those three missing
months had given her a violent distaste for being poked and
prodded. Not being a good enough actor to fake anything, she'd
instead decided to use her very real abhorrence of needles to
her advantage.

"Cobra handed me the disk," she said. "I then gave it to the
Smoker, but he gave it back again. When I had it checked out,
there was nothing on it." The needle came closer and Scully
moved back a bit more, feigning terror, not having to work too
hard at it or at injecting a tremor in her voice. "He must have
switched it somehow." She continued. "I don't know what more to
tell you."

The woman moved closer still, bending over awkwardly and
falling into the trap. In a desperate bid to stave off the
inevitable, Scully slid her body sideways down the wall, swung
her legs up and kicked out with all her might at the syringe
nearing her neck.

She was fast, but her opponent was faster, drawing back just in
time for Scully's bound feet to only glance off her forearm
without doing any immediate damage. The syringe went flying and
Scully briefly tasted victory when she heard it land with a
clink that reverberated loudly in the silence that had followed
her aborted kick.

For a moment both she and the woman were frozen in a silent
tableau, she surprised at her success, the other woman
apparently equally surprised and, by the look on her face,
impressed at the dexterity her bound captive had shown with her
sudden and forceful kick.

Then simultaneously their eyes swept to where the syringe had
landed. It still remained intact and they both launched
themselves at it, one to salvage, the other to destroy. Scully
threw herself into an awkward roll, her arms, tied as they
were, protesting loudly. She determinedly ignored them, trying
to reach the prize before her opponent, knowing that in her
bound state it was ultimately useless. The woman could just go
out and get more of the same.

She was determined to pulverize the damn thing and buy herself
some time anyway.

In the end the effort indeed proved futile, a mere moment
before she could roll over and crush the syringe, the woman had
snatched it up and stepped back out of Scully's reach.

When she glanced up, she saw the woman looking at her with
something resembling respect, then reaching back and producing
a gun. She pointed it at Scully's head and ordered her to roll
over on her stomach. Unable to do anything but comply, Scully
did as told and a moment later felt a knee digging painfully
into the small of her back, holding her down, forcing the air
from her lungs. A small sound as the woman uncapped the needle
then a tiny prick and the tickle of blood sliding down her skin
as the needle was pressed lightly against her neck.

"Once more, Agent Scully, tell me where the disk is and we can
avoid this unpleasantness."

"I don't know!"

She felt a small burning pain, just below her ear as the woman
depressed the plunger, and she imagined she could actually feel
the drugs coursing through her veins, doing their toxic job.

"What are you injecting me with? She asked, hating the tremor
that had crept into her voice for real this time. "What's in
there, Sodium Amytal, Sodium Pentothal? What?" No answer was
forthcoming, and Scully made a desperate attempt to still her
limbs and quiet her heartbeat as much as possible in an effort
to delay as long as possible the effects of whatever drug she
had been given.

"It's not gonna help, you know," she continued. Her words might
as well have been directed at the wall for all the reaction she
got but she kept at it more for herself than anything else. She
had to know later that she'd done everything she could to
prevent this. "All the studies show that the efficaciousness of
these so called truth sera are debatable at best. At most the
subject will perhaps reveal some of his deep-rooted desires but
usually asking direct questions does not produce the desired
result. If pressed into answering them anyway the subject will
often exhibit a tendency to..."

"Quiet!" A sharp slap to the back of her head convinced her to
shut up.

Silence for a while as they both waited for the drug to take
effect, Scully with trepidation, the woman with obvious
fascination. The hum and buzz of the flickering fluorescent
lights was the only sound in the room. It wasn't long before
she felt her eyelids start to droop and dizziness take hold,
her mind beginning to hum along to the tune of the faltering
lights as the round of questions began anew.

Or rather the same question, over and again.

"Where is the disk?"

Striving mightily to stay coherent, Scully found after a while
that she no longer understood the question and it was all she
could do to keep repeating her stock answers time and again.

"I don't know."

"It was empty."

"I threw it away."

"I don't know."

An endless merry-go-round that had her finally reiterating the
three phrases with the mindless repetition of a machine gun
spraying bullets in a steady pattern, careless of where they
hit, heedless after a time of which question was asked at any
given moment. She experienced brief periods of lucidity and
during them was tempted to fabricate a story just so she would
finally be left alone. But the thought that a fabrication would
probably fall apart like a house of cards under these
circumstances kept her back each time. Lies would only land her
into worse trouble and she was not sure she could handle much
more.

Her periods of clarity came less and less frequent as time wore
on and eventually she became so dizzy and the humming in her
head grew so loud that speech escaped her.

Scully sighed with relief when after another incoherent
exchange she finally felt the woman retreat. Briefly she
wondered if perhaps she had inadvertently provided her with the
answers she sought. Then a vicious kick in the ribs told her
she hadn't, even as it robbed her of breath and plunged her
headlong into darkness.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

CHAPTER 3

"So why are you really here, Krycek," Mulder asked.

As curious as he was to know the answer to his question, he
kept his eyes riveted to the road, not sparing Krycek a glance
as he concentrated on getting them over to the Gunmen as
quickly as possible. He drove faster than sensible, weaving in
and out of traffic with what he hoped was the unerring
precision of a surgeon. An image of Scully at the autopsy table
rose before his mind's eye, small capable hands holding a
scalpel, cutting through flesh with expert skill.

He blinked the image away and concentrated on what he was
doing. It was raining and traffic was heavy despite the late
hour, and at the speed they were going a mistake would likely
be fatal. He was thankful for the distraction driving provided.

Krycek mumbled something under his breath, the syllables harsh
and foreign sounding, then raised his voice enough for Mulder
to hear him.

"I was there when they took her."

"What do you mean?" Mulder said, knowing with a sick certainty
exactly what Krycek meant but needing to hear the words all the
same. He wanted to feel angry, but all he felt was a bone deep
weariness.

"I was there when Barry abducted her and handed her over to
them so they could perform their experiments on her." The other
man's voice drifted his way, flat and colorless, as if coming
from a long distance.

Numb with grief at having his suspicions confirmed Mulder
carefully kept his eyes on the rain-slicked asphalt, watching
the blurry white line dividing the road in half disappear under
the car. It was hypnotizing

"I was wrong about you, Krycek," he said. The effort to keep
his voice neutral calmed him enough to enable him to keep his
face equally as impassive. "Your moral dipstick is so dry it's
gonna spontaneously combust one of these days."

"Yeah well..."

Mulder glanced his way and saw those dispassionate green eyes
swivel to meet his. He looked away in disgust, gazing out the
rain-streaked window again just in time to press the
accelerator down a little bit further and run a red light.

"You're telling me you could have helped her, could have told
me where to find her, could have prevented what they did to her
then, and everything that happened to her as a result of it."

"I know."

"So why didn't you?" He was finally getting angry and welcomed
it. It was infuriating to him that this worthless excuse for a
human being had been in a position to help and had stood idly
by and let those horrors befall Scully.

"I was little more than a prisoner myself at the time," Krycek
said. His voice barely rose above the din of the rain drumming
a staccato beat on the roof of the car. "I'd failed them when
you found out I was on their team so quickly and they made sure
I wouldn't be able to waylay them."

"How?"

"They implanted me."

"They what?" Mulder turned towards Krycek in surprise and the
violent movement of his body and the accompanying jerk of his
hands on the steering wheel made them swerve dangerously onto
the other side of the road. Tires screeched and horns blared as
several motorists furiously sounded their disapproval, but he
was able to get control of the car and continued on their way
without stopping, ensuring himself with a glance in his
rearview mirror that no real harm had been done.

Krycek picked up where they'd left off as if nothing had
happened. "They put a chip in my neck as they did her, to
monitor me, control me."

"I don't believe you."

"Then don't."

Krycek stopped speaking, apparently suddenly finding the swipe
of the windscreen wipers more fascinating than their discussion
and Mulder shot him a look, raising his left eyebrow in a show
of disbelief that would have made Scully proud. Perhaps he'd
also mastered that special trick that went along with the look
-- the one which always made him want to explain himself in the
face of her incredulity -- because it spurred Krycek on as
well.

"Look," he said, exasperation coloring his hitherto flat voice.
"I won't try to persuade you I'm just as pure and noble as you
perceive yourself to be. I'm not. But if you think this whole
mess we're in is the job I volunteered for, think again."

"If you were implanted, then how come you weren't called to
that dam in Pennsylvania when she was?"

"You got her the new and improved chip when she was dying of
cancer."

"I don't understand..."

"Science evolves, Mulder. The new chip was modified to an
extent. It was stronger for one, and new commands were inserted
to fit the new timeframe of the Project."

"You didn't answer my question," Mulder said, finding himself
genuinely curious as to where exactly Krycek was going with
this, even if the subject was so close to his heart that
thinking about it made him nauseous with suppressed rage. "Why
weren't you there to burn with the others?"

Krycek shrugged. "Because I never had mine upgraded."

"Why not?"

"They didn't feel the need, I'd already proven my usefulness to
them."

"I don't buy it Krycek," Mulder spat out viciously, feeling
better for having allowed himself to let some of his anger
bleed through in his voice. "You're a double-dealing rat
bastard who only serves his own agenda. If that chip does what
you say it does, how come you were able to fool them all this
time?"

"I discovered how to work around it, shut it out. It took me a
long time, years as a matter of fact, but I've managed to learn
to filter any output and block most of the input."

"You're full of crap, Krycek."

"Am I?" Krycek said. "You shouldn't be so surprised, Mulder.
It's what Scully somehow instinctively knew to do almost as
soon as the original implant was put in. She was only called to
that dam because she was still learning to control the improved
chip you gave her."

The words stung, she'd been put in danger because he'd given
her a new chip, but if he hadn't given her the chip, she would
have succumbed to the cancer eating away at her body. The
reminder of that dark time sent shivers down his spine.

"So how come it took you years to accomplish what you say
Scully was able to do in a matter of months," Mulder asked. He
was at a loss, not knowing what to believe anymore. Wanting,
no, needing, Scully by his side to help poke holes in what
Krycek was telling him.

Krycek shook his head, a curious look on his face that it took
Mulder a moment to recognize as respect. "I have some
suspicions, but nothing concrete. All I know is she did. She's
a remarkable woman." Mulder looked up in surprise at the
unsolicited compliment directed at his absent partner, but
could detect nothing in Krycek's face or posture that hinted at
derision. " I don't think there is anything she couldn't do if
she set her mind to it."

Mulder didn't know how to respond to that, so he kept his mouth
shut. He was dumbfounded at what he'd heard and desperately
needed to put it all into some kind of perspective, but to do
that he'd need to talk to Scully first, and to be able to talk
to her, he needed to find her. His need for her was palpable,
as was his fear of failing her.

He glanced at Krycek, but Krycek's inscrutable face reflected
nothing but the glistening tracks the rain made as it slid down
the windscreen in the glare of the streetlights. His expression
gave nothing away, explained nothing. His strange tale revealed
nothing of his reasons for being here, except that he thought
Scully was remarkable, and maybe that he wished to learn from
her the secret to unlocking the mysteries of their implants?

The rain was coming down in sheets now, and it was getting
harder to maneuver through the heavy traffic clogging the road.
In what he recognized was an effort to distract himself, Mulder
found himself wondering irrelevantly why it was so fucking busy
at such an ungodly hour, then realized it was Saturday night.

Remember Saturday night Mulder? He asked himself in that snarky
inner voice that had a habit of slipping out at the most
inopportune moments. Remember how some people have lives, they
go out and have a bite to eat with their significant others or
a drink with their buddies? They do not drive around discussing
implants and cancer and fiery death and miraculous escape while
trying to prevent another tragedy from happening to the one
person in the world who makes getting up in the morning
worthwhile.

He squelched that thought, preventing the morose turn his
thoughts were taking and concentrated on driving instead. He
floored it when he saw a break in traffic and swerved into the
other lane to overtake a taxi then eased into their own lane
again.

When he glanced over at his companion, he saw that Krycek had
slid down in his seat, head resting nonchalantly against the
headrest, eyes closed. Obviously he didn't want to talk anymore
either, and that was just fine with Mulder.

They drove the rest of the way in silence.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

A boot colliding with her knee, a brutal wake up call, plunging
her headlong from the oblivion of drugged unconsciousness into
a waking nightmare.

Barely coherent, knowing she should wake up but finding it
almost impossible to gather her wits about her. Mind sluggish
with poison still.

Fleeting sensation of urgency, then lethargy taking over again,
drifting for a moment longer and the sound of a rough voice
painfully loud in her ears forcing her to start paying
attention, words bouncing against her eardrums like the dribble
of a basketball against concrete.

Opening her eyes, squinting, noticing with detachment that the
second neon light had burned out finally, gonna miss the buzz
guys, strobe job already taken up by the next little soldier
huh, the light flickering in her face in response.

Callused hands on her ankles, untying her feet but not gently,
blood joyously rushing into places left unvisited for too long,
burning like an acid river, eating away at her flesh.

Strong arms hauling her upright, her knees giving out beneath
her, weak from the drugs, the left one already swollen and
aching where the boot had landed.

Hands in her hair, pulling, little pinpricks all over her
scalp, follicles all piping up as one, voicing their discontent
against the abuse, a fist jerking her face around to meet angry
little eyes set in a broad, vaguely Hispanic looking face.

"Hi there, Red."

A vicious smile and a knee in the ribs, right where the bruises
from getting kicked earlier were deepest, gasping at the pain
in her chest, trying to assess the damage, the faint crack
she'd heard telling her that at least one rib was broken.

"What the hell do you want from me?" Her voice, surprisingly
strong after just having had the wind so thoroughly knocked out
of her, booming in her own head, sound swelling as if along the
nave of a church up to the ceiling vaults to beat against the
stained glass windows standing guard there.

"Nothing much." A push in the direction of a bucket of water
standing in the middle of the room, stumbling on senseless feet
that were only gradually starting to realize they were still
attached to her body and had a function to perform. "Just the
answer to this question that has been plaguing my employer for
some time now."

"42..."

"What?"

"42..." Her drug addled brain still not firing on all cylinders
yet, the thought slipping out before she was able to keep a lid
on it.

"What the fuck are you talking about, bitch?"

A sharp slap, lips swelling up instantly like twin helium
balloons rising to the ceiling, the new pain barely
registering, blotted out by the soreness in her ribs.

The sinking feeling in her gut telling her that maybe now was
not the time to start doing a Mulder and smart-mouth her
captors even as the next words were already sneaking out.

"The answer to life, the universe and everything." A small
smile playing around her puffed lips. "42."

A fist in her face, her left cheekbone exploding in pain then
going instantly numb as if recognizing the futility of
recording anything if no one was there to pay attention. A
liquid sensation where his ring had gouged a ragged path
through her skin, blood trickling down past her jaw and
splattering on her white tank top.

Why are you surprised?  That's what Mulder always gets for his
trouble.

The voice again, thundering in her ears like Zeus raining down
his wrath from Mount Olympus. "So that's the way it's gonna be,
huh?" Sounding pleased rather than disappointed. "Good, I have
some treats in store for you, Red."

Hands grabbing her shoulders with bruising force, a kick to the
back of her legs, the floor rushing up to meet her and she,
powerless to stop it with her hands bound behind her back.

Eyes closed against the glare of the overhead lights flickering
off the still surface of the water, flinging bright starbursts
of light against the whitewashed walls, bathing the room in
otherworldly splendor.

Screaming with hysterical laughter inside her own mind, waxing
poetic about a neon light and a bucket of water, you're losing
it big time, girlfriend.

Landing on her knees with a bone-jarring thump, the already
damaged joint in her left one shrieking in protest, cutting
through the numbness with precision, eyes flying open and she
was still falling.

A fist in her hair preventing her from hitting the floor head
on and knocking herself out, wishing she'd continued falling
straight down, follow the white rabbit, Alice where are you
now? Can't seem to find that rabbit hole...

"Last chance! Tell us what we want to know. Where did you hide
it?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

The water rushing up to meet her, big gulp of air, coolness of
water on her burning cheek, lungs bursting, water rushing back,
and she, gulping in air as she was pulled back from the brink
of oblivion. Hair in her eyes and tears there too, somewhere,
indistinguishable from the water lodged in her lungs and
sinuses.

"The disc bitch, where did you hide the disk."

"Which disk? I already told her I don't..."

Plunging towards the water again, faintly pink now. Lungs
burning again, longer this time before she was brought up,
coughing and choking and still no idea what they wanted from
her, being dunked under time and again until finally oblivion
came and stayed.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

"What's going on, Mulder?" Langly was holding open the door for
him before he'd even been able to use the buzzer. Frohike and
Byers were right behind him. It was not lost on him that in
order not to waste time letting him in, the trio had already
thrown their gazillion deadbolts and locks and had disabled the
assorted other security features they'd installed in their
boundless paranoia.

Touched at this show of concern he nevertheless didn't bother
to express his appreciation, knowing his friends had as little
patience for such niceties as he had himself, instead brushing
past Langly and half knocking the other two out of his way in
his drive to get some answers.

He'd found himself inexplicably short of breath during the
final leg of their car ride over here, lungs aching with the
strain of getting air into them. Images and feelings kept
popping up that were wholly unrelated to anything he was doing.
Light bouncing off water until he was dizzy with it, pain and
confusion -- fear. Somehow, he'd known that he was catching an
echo of what Scully was going through and the thought fuelled
his own fear and anger.

When suddenly the extraneous sensations ceased, worry had
quickly evolved into dread and he'd stepped on the gas even
more relentlessly, wishing irrationally for one of those Star
Trek Comm badges that would transport its owner instantaneously
from one place to the other. "Beam me up, Scotty" yeah right,
doesn't work like that getting from one place to the other in
DC, Captain Kirk, real life's a bitch that way.

Without a word, he made for the inner sanctum and the row of
computers diligently scrolling data in the center of it,
leaving a trail of water in his wake. He'd gotten drenched
during the short walk from the car to the Gunmen's lair and his
thin T-shirt was plastered against his skin, but he paid no
attention to the chill sinking into his flesh, mind focused
absolutely on getting to Scully as fast as possible.

"What kind of trouble is she in, Mulder?" Frohike asked,
sounding every bit as frantic as Mulder himself was feeling.
The little man put his hand on his wrist and stayed him, his
eyes burning with an intensity which told him that if he were
in any way responsible for Scully's troubles he would soon find
himself six feet under. Mulder couldn't blame him, the torch
Frohike carried for Scully rivaled his own, and was in many
ways purer for the fact that the feelings the Gunman had for
his much beloved and lusted after G-woman stood no chance of
being reciprocated. He knew this and worshipped her anyway.

The oldest of the Gunmen was as fiercely protective of his
partner as Mulder was himself and the thought comforted him.
All three in their respective ways had let her into their
paranoid little circle years ago and they would move heaven and
earth to help him find her. And if there was anything of worth
on the damn disk that started this mess, then if anyone could
get to it they would.

"Bad trouble," Mulder said. He shook off Frohike's hand and
moved further into the room, running an absentminded hand
through his wet hair and leaving his friend at the door, mouth
gaping open and color draining from his face.

"What can we do to help," Byers asked, always the calmest of
the bunch, he didn't waste time on unnecessary expressions of
sympathy and cut right to the chase.

"Did you get a match on that partial plate yet?" Mulder said,
not daring to hope he'd be so lucky.

"Yeah, a number of possible hits, five of them with prior
records, they're your best bet, we think." Byers led him to the
terminal nearest them and quickly tapped some keys. Five
pictures appeared on the screen before them.

"Got any info on them yet," Mulder asked, studying the faces
before him as if staring at them hard enough would reveal the
culprit.

"Yeah," Byers said. "Name and address plus rap sheet on all
five, the addresses are bogus though, we're running a deep
background check as we speak. We already tried their home
numbers." At Mulder's horrified look he quickly added, "Don't
worry, we were careful and as I said they were bogus. Only one
address picked up. A woman, didn't know where her husband was,
didn't care to know."

"How long will those background checks take?"

"Shouldn't be much longer," Langly said. He moved to stand next
to Byers and punched in some keys, handling the keyboard with
more force than Mulder had ever seen him use. Information began
to scroll down and he peered intently at the screen, then
tapped some more keys. A slow smile spread over his face. "I'm
in," he said with triumph and relief in his voice. He punched
in another string of commands and sat back to wait for the
machine to retrieve the info he'd requested.

"Tell us what's going on Mulder." Frohike to his right, hands
clad in his ever-present fingerless gloves, fidgeting nervously
with the fringes of his vest. His voice was troubled, and
Mulder shot him an understanding look.

"Someone lifted Scully from her bed," he replied. "They were
looking for a disk she didn't know she had in her possession.
Remember when she went with the Smoker and got duped?" At their
affirmative nods he produced the disk and handed it to Byers.
"Apparently he repented and slipped this disk into her CD
collection. Supposedly, it contains the information that we
didn't find on the disk she brought back with her."

"He repented?" Frohike's sounded as skeptical as Mulder had
felt when Krycek first told him of the Smoker's change of
heart.

He glanced over at Frohike, nodding in wordless assent, then
swiveled his gaze back and watched Byers put in the disk. The
bearded Gunman typed in some commands. "Whoa." The unaccustomed
outburst from the quietest of the Gunmen startled the other
three men.

Moving to stand behind Byers, Mulder peered down at the screen.
"What is it," he asked, impatience coloring his voice.

"There's some sort of enhanced background data on here
alright," Byers said. Frohike and Langly moved closer, watching
with avid interest as their comrade punched in another string
of keys. "Lots and lots of it," he continued without looking
up. "But it's sealed tight."

Langly leaned over and whistled softly under his breath. "It's
going to be a bitch and a half to unlock it," he said. "It's
all encrypted, password protected..." Gently shoving Byers out
of the way, he sat down in front of the terminal and began
pounding away at the keyboard. His smudged glasses were
rendered opaque by the blue light washing from the computer
screen.

"Is your Kung Fu going to crack it, Langly," Mulder asked with
apprehension.

"If mine won't, nothing will." The twitch in his cheek belied
his confident tone.

A discreet ding had Byers and Frohike turning to the other
computer in perfect synchrony, like a geeked up version of an
Esther Williams movie. Information was now scrolling along the
screen to complement the data they'd already compiled.

Quickly scanning the data, Byers punch up a photo and turned to
Mulder, face grim. "Given what you just told us, I think this
one's our best bet."

"What have you got?"

"His name's Bolton, used to work odd jobs for the DOD."

"I need the address." Mulder said, thankful that they were
finally getting somewhere. He was revved, knowing in his gut
that this was the guy. "Do you have any info on alternate
hangouts?"

"Yeah." Byers quickly wrote down what information he had, then
handed the piece of paper to Mulder, holding on to it when
Mulder snatched at it with impatient fingers.

"Were coming with you, Mulder, he said. "Scully would kick our
asses if we let you go out there alone."

"I think I need professional backup on this one," Mulder said,
making his way towards where Langly was working on the disk.
Two heads swiveled in his direction; eyes hurt as they began to
simultaneously voice their protest, loudly. Langly was working
on cracking the disk and didn't spare him a glance, oblivious
to anything but the challenge put before him. Mulder stopped
next to him and looked at the screen. Langly had made no
progress cracking the disk yet and Mulder he was not surprised
in the least, he'd need time and there wasn't any. He
wordlessly held out his hand and, with a sigh of defeat, Langly
handed over the disk.

Mulder pocketed it and made for the door, only to find Frohike
and Byers blocking it, hands on hips and a determined glare in
their eyes.

"No offense guys," he said, brushing past them. He grabbed the
doorknob but felt a strong hand closing down around his arm and
turned to his friends. "Look you're not exactly the gun-toting
swashbuckling 007 action type heroes this job demands."

"And you are," they asked in unison.

"It's Scully's life that's on the line, so yes, I am." He
couldn't quite suppress a grin at their doubtful looks.
"Besides I need you guys here on backup duty and I need you all
in one piece when I return with Scully and the disk." This
earned him a gratified look from Byers and a grim nod from
Frohike.

Opening the door and stepping through into the darkness beyond,
he threw a glance over his shoulder that was meant to instill
confidence. "And don't worry, I've got backup."

"Who?" Frohike asked. "Skinner?"

"Krycek." With that he was out the door, only too aware that
the reassurance they'd derived from his confident glance had
been obliterated by the shocking statement that had followed
hot on its heels.

Their indignant voices followed him all the way to the car.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

CHAPTER 4

This time when she came to, Scully found the transition much
more gradual. A slow rising, from blissful dreams of escaping
and making her way to Mulder and freedom, to the dismal reality
of captivity. With the remnants of her dreams still clinging to
the edges of her consciousness she tried to take stock of her
situation and soon realized the odds for escape were decidedly
against her.

She was sitting on one of the stiff wooden chairs with her
hands tied to the armrests and her feet similarly bound. Her
abused body was aching all over. The worst of it centered in
her ribs and her left knee where she had mercilessly been
kicked awake earlier. A hazy self-inspection confirmed her
earlier diagnosis of at least one broken rib, and added a
possible hairline fracture to the zygomatic bone and a wrecked
knee to her list of injuries.

As full consciousness returned she fought to get a handle on
the pain, pushing it down deep, and surreptitiously began to
take in her surroundings. They were still in the same room, the
bucket she had nearly drowned in still standing there; half
empty now, a puddle of water surrounding it. She gave a small
grunt as she tried to shift her weight in the uncomfortable
chair and her sore ribs took exception, and slowly became aware
that a lamp was shining in her face, so close that the heat
from the bulb was scorching the fine hairs on her cheek.

Interrogation room tactics, she thought disjointedly. I know
those like the back of my hand. Beat me at my own game, huh?
Want a piece of free advice? That single-bright-bulb-in-the-
face-bit would work much, much, better without the damned neon
lights flickering and buzzing overhead, you stupid morons.

She reined in her rebellious inner voice, telling herself to
get her act together, remembering the way she'd lost it
earlier. Quoting "The Hitchhiker's Guide" had not been a smart
move, nor was smart mouthing to herself about the ineptitude of
her captors' interrogation methods going to get her out of the
mess she was in. Now was not the time to go off the deep end.

Her stern inner pep talk was actually raising her spirits a bit
but its uplifting effect came to an abrupt end as a sudden and
violent coughing fit left her exhausted and trembling even as
it betrayed her return to consciousness to her captors.

As she looked up, she found the broad Hispanic face moving into
her line of vision again, lips moving, rough voice repeating
the same questions. Could they possibly think she did know more
about the disk but hadn't spilled the beans yet, was their
estimation of her stamina that high?  She was horrified to
realize she was about to laugh hysterically at the thought and
strove mightily to tamp down her ill-timed flash of mirth. It
was already too late though, apparently he knew how to read her
already and before she could either give in to her compulsion
or overcome it, his fist buried itself in her stomach.

The air whooshed out of her lungs and gray blurred the edges of
her vision as she found herself utterly unable to breathe. Pain
crashed through her ribs and her lungs burned from lack of
oxygen and the memory of drowning in a bucket of pink tinged
water.

The memory had her gagging and when bile rose in her throat,
she desperately lurched sideways as much as her bindings would
allow and threw up over the side of the chair. Not much there
to come up, thankfully, airline dinner and a little bit of
wine, she thought nonsensically as another spasm wracked her
body. Her ribs were in agony, the excruciating pain adding to
her need to throw up. A vicious cycle repeating itself until
she was left dry heaving and all that came up was bile.

The sight of her own vomit, most of it on the floor beside her,
some of it coating her arm and more of it splattered all over
her shirtsleeve, leaving a stain that would never come out,
distressed her. Even more so, when she realized the stain was
tinged red. Panic swept through her at the thought that her
injured ribs might have done some untold internal damage but
then she remembered the wine she'd had when taking her bath
upon her return home. It had been red; a nice Merlot, her tired
brain supplied.

Somewhat relieved, Scully fought to stay conscious. Willing her
breathing to even out and her muscles to relax, she strove to
lift her head and face her tormentor head on.

What she saw when her eyes alighted on him stole her breath
anew, though, and made her wish she had just let go and let
herself slip into the void.

Python was standing over her, teeth bared in a vicious snarl, a
strange look in his eyes that it took her a moment to identify
as arousal. In his right hand, he held a claw hammer, in his
left, sparks glittered off a handful of wickedly long nails.

"Don't," she managed to force out as he slowly advanced on her.
Her eyes were riveted on the nails in his left hand. "Don't do
this. I'm not going to be telling you anything new."

Python's lewd grin only grew wider. The bulge in his pants
clearly announced he was getting a huge sexual charge out of
the dread his practiced approach -- his weapons' intended use
easy to guess but the specifics left up to the imagination --
instilled in his victim.

However hard she tried to suppress her fear, she knew it was in
her body language and in her voice. She also knew that trying
to hide it would probably be futile, he would be well-versed in
identifying it, no doubt knowing where to look for it from the
countless times he'd done this to other hapless victims. She
was determined to not give him the satisfaction of seeing her
cave in though, and forced her abused body to sit up a little
bit straighter in the chair.

"But we think you just might, Agent Scully, we think we may
have been talking at cross purposes here." The cultured voice
of the woman who had first interrogated her came from behind
Python's back. As the woman stepped out from behind him and
into her line of sight Scully could see the look of contempt
with which she regarded her accomplice. She felt a momentary
surge of hope; perhaps she could play on the other woman's
sentiments and avoid getting hurt at the hands of the patently
sadistic brute hovering over her.

When she threw another assessing glance her way Scully's brief
surge of hope was instantly squashed. There was an exited glint
in those cold green eyes that didn't augur well for her. It
told her the torment to come would be inflicted on her whatever
she said because they both wanted it albeit for different
reasons, Python just for the pleasure of seeing her squirm, the
woman for the pleasure of seeing her break down and confess.

So she chose to say nothing, trying to conserve her strength
for what surely lay ahead. All she allowed herself was a raised
eyebrow, letting her expression speak for her. The effort sent
faint crackles of pain along her cheekbone and the arch was not
as high or perfectly curved as it might have been, but the
woman seemed more than able to read the question on her face
anyway.

"I have been thinking," she said, approaching Scully in her
chair and crouching next to her. "Maybe you indeed do not know
you have the disk in your possession. Spender's a crafty old
bastard after all. It might be that he slipped it in with your
belongings without your knowledge."

Scully jerked back as the woman reached out and trailed her
fingers along the cut on her swollen cheek. The gesture was
almost tender, and seemed so oddly out of place that it made
Scully's head swim.

"How could he have?" she asked. The words were out before she
knew it and she cursed herself for her lack of control.

The woman smiled and straightened up, keeping her gaze on her
captive's face all the while. "Tell me, have you bought any new
CD's lately?"

Scully physically felt the jolt as memory slammed into her.
Mulder dancing in the office just before going off to
investigate crop circles in England. His movements sensuous and
graceful, more so than she would have given him credit for,
never having had the occasion to see him dance before. She'd
liked the song--now she liked the memory it evoked--and had
made an effort to find out who the artist was, then bought the
disk. When he found it in her car stereo Mulder's eyes had lit
up and she'd lent it to him.

It was the only CD she'd bought in months, and she knew without
a doubt that it was the one these animals were after, though
she still didn't have a clue how that might be.

Fighting to keep her expression neutral Scully faced her
tormentors and lied to their faces, shaking her head to give
force to her breathed denial. All the while she was desperately
praying to a God that seemed to have abandoned her that this
time, for once, her lie would not be unmasked as soon as it
left her mouth. She knew she was a bad liar and knew it had
everything to do with her distaste of dishonesty and her need
for telling the truth. Her many "I'm fine's" technically
weren't lies as she knew Mulder took them for what they were, a
plea for distance more then anything else, besides, he only
ever heeded them when he wanted to, anyway. The few times she
had been forced by circumstances to lie outright, she'd usually
been easily found out and invariably she'd been left with a bad
taste in her mouth.

A chuckle from Python told her that her track record remained
intact and that he'd seen right through her charade. She
steeled herself as she saw his female accomplice step aside to
let him approach.

"Now we're getting somewhere," he crowed as he pressed the
sharp end of the nail into the back of her left hand. Scully
watched in fascination and dread as blood welled up from the
tiny puncture mark.

"Last chance, Agent Scully." The woman's voice was low with
anticipation.

Scully determinedly shook her head, not about to tell them who
had the disk and risk his life. A moment later her world
exploded into pain as the hammer found its mark and the nail
was driven through her hand and into the wooden armrest below
it. Everything she had suffered before this, any pain she'd
ever been in, with the possible exception of the gunshot wound
to her gut that time in New York, paled in comparison to the
agony that now overwhelmed her. She bit her lip to keep herself
from screaming and her mouth was flooded with the metallic
taste of blood as her teeth sunk in deep. Her body arched in
the chair, bindings digging deep into her wrists and ankles and
drawing blood. The sharp movement sent a jolt of renewed pain
through her sore ribs and swollen knee but she didn't even feel
it, lost as she was in the sheer agony radiating from her left
hand. Like a conquering invader it traveled up her arm in
sickening waves and buried itself right near where her heart
was beating wildly in her chest, taking up residence there.

When darkness descended like a lover, she welcomed it, letting
it envelop her, soothing the ache that was her body. Scully
closed her eyes and willingly let herself fall deeper into
unconsciousness, grateful for the reprieve.

Her plunge into oblivion was rudely interrupted, when something
cold and wet hit her in the face and had her coughing up a
lungful of water. Her eyes flew open and Python was standing in
front of her, still holding the now empty bucket of water in
his hands. He bent down and his face was inches from hers. His
breath smelled faintly and not unpleasantly of cloves.

Incongruous, she thought, hysteria threatening. Halitosis would
have fitted his profile better.

"Oh no you don't, Red," he said. "No passing out for you, babe.
You're going to sit here and contemplate telling the truth.
We'll be back in a little while and we'll keep doing this to
you until you tell us what we want to know." He flicked his
nail against the spike embedded in her hand and the minute
contact sent shivers of pain running up and down her arm.
Attila, readying his troops for a renewed assault. "Meanwhile
I'll keep myself busy thinking where I'll put in the next on."
Sticking out his tongue, he touched it to the corner of her
left eye where tears of pain had squeezed out and left a chill
trail down her cheek. "I'm looking forward to it already Red,
don't think I'm not."

With that they were gone and she was left sitting in the chair.
Nailed to the spot Agent Scully, literally, now how do you
propose we get out of this one, huh?

Shivers ran up and down her body, the cold water had revived
her, and however much she willed the numbness that had
enveloped her moments before to return, it wouldn't. She
desperately needed to sink back into that comforting blanket of
darkness and find some kind of refuge from the pain and dread
gripping her by the throat, but no such luck.

Go figure, she thought morosely. I find myself passing out and
missing chunks of time at regular intervals and this once when
I need it the most it escapes me.

Her overtaxed brain was threatening to shut down where her
aching body wouldn't. Round and round her thoughts went, coming
back to the same issue time and again.

She'd only barely been able to keep herself from screaming
Mulder's name this time. She wasn't sure at all if she'd be
able to pull it off a second time and more than anything else
she didn't want to hand him over to these monsters.

God, help me, she sent up a tired prayer. Give me strength. You
must really have it in for me, huh? Please tell me what I've
done that has offended You. I've tried to live my life by the
rules You set, tried to act true to the spirit of Your word if
not to the ways of the church. Is that where you have found
fault with me? If it is, then please deliver me from evil and
I'll go to Mass every Sunday from here on out. I'll eat fish on
Friday and confess each and every impure, un-partnerly thought
if you'll just get me out of here. I'll stop coveting what I
cannot have, and will say a prayer of thanks every night for
what I do have.

Snapshots of Emily and Mulder flashed before her mind's eye.

Now would be a good time to come bursting through that door,
Mulder. You've played the part of the avenging angel on my
behalf more times than I can count. Be my angel once more,
Mulder? Please don't be too long. I don't know how much longer
I'll be able to stand this.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

They finally found Andrew Bolton at the fourth and last address
on their list of alternate locations. Rotten luck, Mulder
mused, proving once again that whenever you're looking for
something it's always the last possibility on your list which
will turn out to be the right one, except when you start out
with the last possibility, in which case the first one will be
correct.

They pulled up in front of a run-down apartment building and
Mulder was out the car before Krycek had fully killed the
engine.

At the edge of his consciousness, images and sensations again
stirred. Scully, he now knew without a doubt, and was relieved
at the re-established connection even as he realized her pain
and her fear had both increased significantly. He tried his
best to ignore the terror the images and sensations evoked in
him without totally shutting them out, feeling that if he did
he'd be abandoning her in the worst possible way.

It was still raining and he was drenched in a heartbeat, water
soaking through his T-shirt and jeans but he hardly noticed the
discomfort. Wiping some wet strands of hair out of his eyes, he
approached the building he hoped housed their prey and found
the front door to the building locked. He was just about to
blow the lock off in his haste to get in when Krycek shouldered
him out of the way and started fiddling with it. A moment later
the door swung open and Krycek waved him in with a flourish.

At Mulder's appreciative glance he grinned and held up a lock-
pick. "Standard issue bad boy material, Mulder. Comes in handy
huh?"

Ignoring him, Mulder made for the elevators at the end of the
hall. A sign proclaimed both out of service and, cursing his
luck, he started up the stairs, hearing Krycek fall into step
behind him.

The stairwell was as rundown as the rest of the building, steps
old and creaky, linoleum loose in places, puddles forming on
the landings. Mulder didn't want to hazard a guess at the
origins of the puddles but on the second landing, the stench of
urine was thick in the air, making him gag as he sped past. The
peeling wallpaper and burnt out light bulbs every other floor
completed the picture of dilapidation and neglect.

They climbed the stairs to the sixth floor in silence, and,
reaching their destination, took up residence at either side of
the door in silent concord. It was, Mulder thought with faint
amusement, as if they'd been doing this for years, working
together instead of against each other. Weird, the ease with
which they'd slipped back into that state of burgeoning trust
that had marked the very beginning of their brief partnership.

Remember what happened when you started to trust him, though?
His thoughts turned to those three gut wrenching months Scully
had been missing, unerringly finding their way to the precise
filing cabinet he'd stored the memories in and picking the lock
with ease. Remember? You blinked and suddenly she was gone.
Keep your guard up. He surely has an ulterior motive. Don't for
a minute let him fool you into thinking he's doing this for any
other reason than furthering his own agenda.

His musings were interrupted when Krycek silently cursed under
his breath. He'd already opened the lock but there was a
deadbolt on the inside, which would make getting in noiselessly
impossible.

"Break it in," Mulder whispered. Taking his cue as Mulder
stepped back a bit and brought up his gun, pointing it square
at the middle of the doorway, Krycek broke down the door with a
forceful kick. Weapons at the ready, they swept inside in
perfect accord.

Bolton was taken completely by surprise. His head buried
beneath his pillows he was fast asleep and didn't wake up to
the noise of their entrance. The woman sleeping beside him woke
up with a shriek though when the door slammed into the wall.
She sat up straight with a gasp, blankets falling to her hips.
Bolton's hand fell away from her ample breasts and where their
entrance had not roused him, the absence of her warm flesh
obviously did. Groggily he lifted his head, looking at the two
men suddenly standing in the middle of the room with mute
incomprehension.

Before he was able to go for the guy's throat and wring the
truth from him, a sudden bolt of agony seared a pathway up
Mulder's left arm and Scully's voice was in his head, screaming
for him or God or anyone to help her. All he could choke out
was a strangled, "Oh Scully," as he sank to the floor, legs
suddenly made out of rubber, no longer able to support him.
Krycek glanced his way but did not let Mulder's distress deter
him from grabbing Bolton by the hair and pushing his gun into
the soft spot just below his jaw.

"You okay, Mulder?" he threw over his shoulder.

"Yeah," Mulder replied, pushing to his feet and steadying
himself with one hand on the wall. He was shaking
uncontrollably, the aftershocks of pain still lighting up his
nerve endings and the echoes of her desperate cry for help
still bouncing around in his head. He nodded mutely for Krycek
to take the lead in dragging the guy from his bed, knowing that
as livid as he was at the thought of Scully suffering likewise
in the hands of this man's accomplices, he himself might not be
able to stop hurting him. So instead, he took up residence in
the doorway, warning off inquisitive neighbors by pointing his
gun at their sleepy faces while behind him the dull thud of
flesh connecting with flesh sounded once more and Bolton
confessed.

"Okay, okay," he screamed. "Just back off." Another slap
resounded and Mulder couldn't keep a satisfied little smirk
from surfacing on his face.

"So talk," Krycek said, menace plain in his voice.

"Me and Python were supposed to grab the redhead," Bolton said.
"Dump her then take the car and make it disappear on the off
chance that someone might have seen us leaving her apartment."

"What do you mean dump her, you bastard?" Krycek's normally
impassive voice held a note of fury that made him sound more
lethal than a rattlesnake going for the jugular.

"Take it easy man," Bolton pleaded. "Dump her at the warehouse,
I meant."

The guy was obviously scared for his life and Mulder judged him
incapable of lying in his current state so when Krycek grabbed
him by the balls and wrung the location of the warehouse from
him he was reasonably sure it was where they would find Scully.

His brain already computing the fastest route to where they
were going, his eidetic memory serving him well in pulling up
imaginary roadmaps and showing him the way, he made for the
stairs. As he picked up his pace to a near jog, he heard a soft
popping sound behind him. He recognized it instantly as a gun
with a silencer going off, but paid it no heed, plowing ahead,
buoyed by the thought of finding Scully, fuelled by the urgency
of getting to her before it was too late.

He found himself at the building's entrance without conscious
transition, breathing in the clean night air in great gulps. It
had stopped raining and that fresh smell and taste was in the
air that always follows a rainstorm. DC appeared cleansed and
virginal in the storm's wake, if only for a brief moment, and
he gratefully breathed in the scented night air, needing to
clear his head after the dank misery of the stairwell and the
foul aftertaste Bolton's confession had left him with.

His hands clenched and unclenched at his sides, urgent to find
something tangible to get a hold of and vent his fury on. He
knew though, that whatever he did, losing it was not an option,
not while Scully was still out there and in trouble. So instead
he took a deep breath and held it, slowly letting it out and
letting his anger out with it.

He made for their car and reaching it yanked open the door and
slid into his seat, simultaneously whipping out his cell phone
and hitting speed dial 3. Skinner answered just as he sensed
Krycek slipping into the drivers' seat. Strange how he hadn't
heard him walking up or opening the door. The man had an
uncanny knack for getting wherever he was going silently and
unobserved, a fact that he was sure would prove useful in the
hours to come.

Skinner's gruff voice broke him out of his musings. He sounded
more than a little annoyed at being woken up at this late hour.

"Sir, it's Mulder," he said, and saw the startled look and
angry scowl his companion gave him but paid it no heed, instead
concentrating on breaking through the angry tirade his boss was
engaged in on the other end of the line. "I need your help."

In the interlude as he waited for Skinner to recover from the
angry choke he'd heard him emit at his interruption Krycek
started the engine and sped off, narrowly avoiding hitting a
speeding truck as he pulled out of their parking space.

"What is it now Mulder, did aliens land on the White House
lawn? Vampires sucked the life out of the Chicago Hope cast?
What?"

"It's Scully, Sir, she's in trouble. " The inclusion of her
name ensured he suddenly had Skinner's full attention.

"What do you need, Mulder?"

"I need you to get a SWAT team together as soon as possible and
meet me." He gave the address and could hear the scratch of pen
on paper as Skinner copied it down.

"What the hell is going on, Mulder?"

"I don't have time to explain, just trust me on this."

"I'll be there."

"Thank you, Sir."

He punched the off button and threw the phone on the dashboard,
then balled his fist and punched the roof, hard.

"Faster."

Krycek cast a grim look his way and stepped on the gas some
more.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<
 

CHAPTER 5

The agony in her hand had retreated somewhat, mostly because
she'd managed to gather together the ragged threads of her
thankfully formidable capacity for denial and had told herself
the pain wasn't all that bad. It seemed to be helping, as long
as she sat absolutely still the discomfort was indeed just
bearable. The tremors that raced through her made keeping still
very difficult though, as did the violent shivers that wracked
her body, as the water soaking her thin tank top cooled her
fevered flesh to the point of hypothermia.

Having succeeded in convincing herself she was not hurting as
badly as her body insisted she was, Scully's thoughts turned to
God and rescue and Mulder again, the three concepts blending
together in her tired brain. She found herself praying
indiscriminately to the two complementary forces that had
helped give shape to her life these past years. Pleading for
her torture to be put to an end, be it through heavenly
intervention or a SWAT team. As long as she was delivered, it
was all the same to her.

The old adage, "God helps those who help themselves" was not
lost on her either, though. While her mind busied itself
warding off shock by keeping up her walls of denial and
simultaneously praying for strength and deliverance, her
battered body was otherwise occupied.

Her wrists were already bloody and raw, from pulling on the
ropes binding them to the armrests of the chair she was sitting
in. When she tried to move her right hand, she found that the
blood had acted as a lubricant and had loosened her bonds
somewhat. Biting back the new pain, she began moving her hand
in tiny back and forth movements, attempting to extract it from
her bindings.

She had no idea how much good getting one arm free would do
her, but was determined to not sit idly by and let this freak
pin her to the chair like some kind of exotic butterfly.

Not while she was still breathing and even halfway conscious.

Given sufficient time, if she could get one hand free, her legs
would be a cinch, Scully told herself. She had no idea how to
get her other hand free, but forced herself not to ponder the
only two obvious scenarios, trying to pull the nail free with
her right hand, or ripping her left hand free of it by what
would have to be sheer force of will. Better not think of that
until faced with the actual circumstance. No sense
contemplating it, when the prospect of getting free was still a
dim hope beckoning at a distant horizon.

Resolve firmly in place, she kept up her back and forth
movement for what seemed like hours, and bit by bit succeeded
in pulling back her hand until finally all that kept it trapped
was the protrusion of her knuckles.

Freedom that much closer Scully sat back for a moment to catch
her breath, and wondered how much longer her respite would
last. She estimated her inquisitors had been gone for two hours
already, and her time was running out. The thought set her to
work again with a new urgency. Hand moving back and forth, back
and forth.

When the door at the head of the stairs creaked open, she
stilled her movements and threw an expectant glance up the
stairs. For a moment hope surged through her. She was so
focussed on it being Mulder come to rescue her, that she
actually thought she could make out his familiar form standing
at the top of the stairs, looking down at her. Eyes so full of
compassion and relief, but with that deadly rage he'd displayed
on occasion burning behind the hazel, like a backdraft waiting
to happen.

Then light spilled into the basement, and the illusion of
Mulder was gone. She felt the threads of her finely spun web of
denial unraveling when instead Python walked in, hammer and
nails again in his hands. A small whimper threatened to escape,
and she bit down on it, digging deep inside herself, trying to
find the niche where she kept that fabled self-control of hers
tucked away. She'd heard tell of it often, by her friends in
medical school, by her family and colleagues and most
particularly by Mulder. He'd spun legends from the fabric of
their more dangerous cases. The more she'd tried to tone down
his tales, scoffing at his notion that her composure was all
that singular; the more vociferous he'd become. Under his
direction, her cool under fire had become mythical.

Now, Scully cloaked herself in the strength of his belief in
her, sent up a silent prayer, "Anytime Mulder, would be a good
time to come get me out of here" and -- bracing herself --she
met her tormentor's gaze head on.

"Ready to talk, Red?" Python asked. The maniacal glint in his
eyes told her he hoped she wasn't, and she didn't disappoint
him when she shook her head in silent denial.

He descended the stairs and Scully closed her eyes, listening
to his footfalls approach her. They stopped right in front of
her chair, and she again smelled the faint aroma of cloves on
his breath. She forced her eyes open and he was bending over
her, so close she could feel the heat radiating off his body.
Her chilled flesh broke out in goose bumps at his proximity.

"Where do you want it, Red? I'm thinking either here," a faint
prick on her thigh, just above the deep bruising swelling her
knee, "or maybe here." Another jab, high up on her arm this
time, just underneath the shoulder joint. The left one again,
his choices deliberate, compounding pain with pain.

Bastard, she thought, and found herself speaking the sentiment
aloud.

"Go fuck yourself."

Ah, but that felt good.

The feeling was short-lived. Immediately the pressure from the
nail intensified. She could feel it breaking through her skin,
felt the fear she'd managed to reign in up till now start to
chafe at the bit. Blood began to flow in a thin stream down her
arm, and she felt herself beginning to hyperventilate.

God, please. Where's that angelic posse we talked about? I
thought I'd made a convincing argument, thought we'd agreed I
deserve the benefit of the doubt and should be rescued from
further torture, huh? It's still not too late, but time is
growing shorter, don't be too long.

Pleasepleasepleaseplease...

Don't be too long.

Mulder...?

She never took her eyes off Python's, kept her face carefully
blank, determined not to give him the satisfaction of seeing
how much pain she was in, how he frightened her. Resolved he
was not going to know anything of the desperate plea she was
sending heavenward, Scully stared up at him, unblinking, and
his confusion at her steady gaze was gratifying. For an
interminable moment in time, they were locked in an odd stare
down neither seemed able to break; then a sound at the top of
the stairs broke the silence. Despite herself Scully looked up,
hope again flaring then dying out once more as Python's
accomplice entered the room.

The door slowly closed behind her, but did not swing completely
shut, and Scully looked at it longingly. A small stream of
fresh air blew in, valiantly striving to replace some of the
stifling atmosphere generated by her pain and Python's
pleasure. It fortified her waning defenses, gave her the
strength to keep looking evenly into his evil little eyes and
not cringe.

"Don't want to miss the show, huh?" Python threw over his
shoulder. His lewd tone filled her with revulsion and Scully
noted again that his associate found his leering equally as
disgusting, when a small frown appeared between the woman's
eyebrows. The contempt in that cold, green gaze, as she looked
her partner up and down, was plain. Then the woman's gaze slid
to Scully's face and held her eyes for a moment. The momentary
flash of kinship faded, as Scully found no mercy in that
glacial expression. The disgust was there, but it was obvious
that she wouldn't let it stop her from getting the information
she wanted.

Descending the stairs, the woman moved to stand beside her
victim and Python stepped back, taking the pressure at Scully's
shoulder with him. Cool female fingers delicately touched her
blood coated left hand and Scully flinched. The touch, though
light, awakened the pain to its earlier splendor, and had it
pounding at the barriers of denial she had worked so hard at
constructing. For a moment, all three of them looked on in
fascination as slim fingers traced their way up Scully's left
arm, up from her bleeding hand, over her chafed wrist, and on
towards her shoulder. The touch left a streak of blood in its
wake, and tiny explosions of pain set fire to the trail the
fingers left on Scully's oversensitive skin.

When she realized the degree to which her two tormentors were
fascinated by her pain, Scully allowed a tiny but heartfelt
whimper to escape, and watched them both perk up, the woman
coming closer still. Her delicate fingers trailed down to the
place she'd brushed over that had finally elicited a reaction
from her victim. Python looking on with avid interest, perhaps
memorizing the spot for future torture.

With the woman standing so close she could feel her body heat,
Scully seized her opportunity. Clenching her teeth, she pulled
hard. Her right hand slipped free of the rope. Despite the way
her blood, and her back and forth movements had loosened her
bindings, the friction was still bad enough to ensure a good
portion of skin across her knuckles was scraped off. Scully
paid it no mind, and instead lunged for the gun poking from its
place at the woman's back.

Surprise worked in her favor. Scully had her hand on the but of
the gun, before either of her captors had even registered she
had been able to partially free herself. The weapon came loose
from the woman's waistband with a little jerk, and then Scully
had possession of the gun. She aimed it straight at the other
woman's heart.

"Don't move," Scully said, momentarily unsure how to proceed
now that she had the upper hand. In truth, she'd never thought
she'd get this far. Her indecision lasted only a split second.
Realizing the need to act in order to keep her advantage,
Scully waved the gun, motioning the other woman over towards
Python.

"Tie him up, use your belt"

The woman moved, slipping her belt from her middle.

"You," Scully said, turning the gun to Python. "Drop those." A
glance at the hammer and nails, a tightening of her finger on
the trigger, and Python did as he was told.

Scully nodded her appreciation, a tight grin stretching the
skin on her bruised cheek. "Good. Now turn around, and let her
tie you up. Who knows, maybe you'll like it."

The woman stepped up behind Python, and proceeded to tie his
hands behind his back. When she was done, she turned back to
Scully, taking Python with her. He was slightly in front and to
the right of his accomplice, shielding the woman with his body
by her design, rather than from his own volition.

Just as Scully realized what she was up to, the woman shoved
hard, and Python came flying at her. Scully jerked the gun
around, aiming for the cold green eyes. She squeezed the
trigger and tasted victory; it was sweet and tangy and sent a
jolt of renewed energy through her tired limbs. Then 190 odd
pounds of bones and muscle and fat slammed into her. Rather
than toppling them over, the impact shoved the chair against
the wall, Scully still bound to it. She groaned as the breath
was knocked from her, for what must have been the umpteenth
time that day, and a surge of agony ripped through her hand.

Miraculously, Scully managed to maintain her grip on the gun,
but when she attempted to lift it, she found that her strength
had all but deserted her. There was a roaring in her ears, and
her vision was blurred. Pain pulsed up and down her arm in time
with her heartbeat. Python was across her lap, groggy from
slamming his head against the armrest of the sturdy chair. His
weight on her damaged knee added its own blues and greens to
the painter's palette of her misery.

Move, move, move; she told herself, eyeing the door at the top
of the stairs. It stood slightly open, as if beckoning her.
Freedom is within reach, there's still time. Get the gun on
him, before he wakes up and realizes the position he's in. He
can incapacitate you, just by rolling over on your arm, or
butting his head against you ribs, so move!

Her arm came up slowly, her mind picturing the business end of
the gun going in his ear with no small amount of glee, when
finally her tired brain registered that she'd never heard the
gunshot ring out. In the pervading silence of the basement,
empty of all sounds except those made by its occupants, the
shot should have been as loud as a mid-sized explosion.

"Impressive, Agent Scully." The feeling of a gun at her temple
stilled her movements. "Now drop the gun."

Scully did as told, the gun dropping to the ground with a dull
thud. Her eyes swiveled to the woman standing over her,
completely unscathed, calmly pointing a gun at her and using
her free hand to haul Python off her lap, letting him fall to
the floor none too gently. Python groaned and sat up straight,
while the woman smiled and answered her unspoken question.

"Always be prepared, especially when dealing with pesky FBI
Agents, sure to have a few tricks up their sleeves. First rule
of survival. In this case, prepared equals making sure there's
no bullet in that first chamber." Looking over at Python who
was slowly getting to his feet, she added, "Or second rule
actually. First one is, always have a body handy to sacrifice
when things don't go as planned."

Python shot his accomplice a foul look, but kept his peace.
Intent on taking up where he'd left off, he presented his bound
hands to the woman, and let her untie him. Rubbing his head,
where a bruise as large as a Ping-Pong ball was beginning to
show, he bent down, gathered his hammer and nails, and turned
his attention to Scully. Smiling down at her, he used the belt
to tie her free right hand to the armrest, cinching it tight
over her already damaged wrist. Scully winced as the leather
bit deeply into her abraded flesh. Python's smile grew gleeful
as he gave the belt a last hard jerk, ostensibly to test her
bindings, and stepped back to admire his handiwork.

With an appreciative nod, he stooped down and whispered, "That
stunt will cost you, Red, cost you dearly."

Then the pressure at her shoulder was back, the nail slipping
back into the puncture mark it left earlier as if it belonged
there.

Anger coursed through her, directed at a God who had apparently
abandoned her, some of it going Mulder's way for not being here
to rescue her. The irony of that thought was not lost on her.
Wasn't she the one who always told him she could take care of
herself, told him there was no need to be so overprotective?
Way to finally start listening to me, partner. Your timing
really sucks.

Then all thoughts were wiped from her mind, as she heard the
words that damned her, enunciated in that soft Southern drawl.

"Do it."

Time stood still and every sound and sensation seemed to be
preternaturally amplified in those few precious seconds before
the hammer fell, and plunged her straight into hell. Python
straightened up with a rustle of cotton swishing against denim,
getting ready to strike. She imagined she could hear the
whistle of air as he drew his hand back, like those silly kung
fu movies, where the sound effects were always way over the
top, could smell his excitement -- feral -- a half remembered
zoo smell, strongest around the hyena cages at feeding time.

Cold air caressed her cheek as the door at the top of the
stairs blew open a bit, then whooshed shut again. The click as
it finally fell into its lock echoed like a gunshot in the
oppressive silence. She could hear the air rasping in her lungs
as she took a deep breath; could feel the cool fire of tears
searing a path down her cheeks from the corners of her eyes as
she squeezed them shut, trying to prepare for the blow and the
pain to come.

With a rush of air the hammer came down. Scully was aware of
the nail burrowing its way into her flesh; heard her collarbone
break with a snap like a twig that's been stepped on; felt the
trickle of blood flowing down her arm turn into a river. She
looked down and felt her stomach clench at the sight of the
nail impaling her shoulder and anchoring her to the chair.

In those first moments though, there was no pain, only the
absence of it. All she could do, for seconds that stretched
like hours, was look at the spreading stain of blood painting
her shoulder a lurid red in wide eyed disbelief.

The pain, when it finally came, was much, much worse than
anything she had been able to prepare for, and as it screamed
through her, Scully could do nothing but scream with it.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

Mulder followed Krycek through a crack in the warehouse's
backdoor, gun out and pointing the way. It was still just the
two of them; Skinner and his backup had been nowhere in sight
yet when they reached the warehouse. The two men had shared a
glance, and moved towards the backdoor as one, Krycek in the
lead, producing his lock-pick and opening the door without
effort.

Mulder found himself, unconsciously and a little against his
will, envying the man's skill at breaking and entering, as he
followed Krycek's silhouette through darkened hallways.
Operating under a severe disability, having the use of only one
good arm, he'd displayed a dexterity getting into locked places
that far surpassed most able-bodied men.

Mulder couldn't but admire the sheer will and determination
that must have fuelled this man, and had made him the
formidable force he was despite his disability. He'd always
thought Krycek a force of evil though, and was loath to admit
that in helping him find Scully, the man had shown a different
side of himself. Even if the double-dealing rat bastard had
from time to time shown up to give Scully and him a hand, it
had always been with an ulterior motive that usually benefited
no one but Krycek himself, and it was comfortable thinking of
him as being evil. Seeing the man in such black and white terms
was vastly easier than having to re-evaluate him in light of
these latest developments.

Forced to do so, Mulder found himself wondering at Krycek's
strange tale earlier in the car, and his decision to help
Scully where he had up till now never shown such compunction.
He still didn't trust the man, but had to reluctantly admit
that without him, he would never have been able to get so close
so fast. Hell, without him, he probably wouldn't even have
known Scully was in trouble yet. The man's motivations in
helping him find Scully were as muddled as ever though. Was
Krycek really out to repay a debt, just in it to fuck with him
a bit, following the Smoker's instructions on some intricate
ploy or other designed to waylay him and Scully in their quest,
or was he after Scully's supposed secrets in mastering her
implant? And what the hell was up with that, anyway?

He put a hand on Krycek's shoulder, feeling the need to have
his doubt answered first, instead of blithely heading off into
a potentially lethal situation with an unknown quantity
guarding his back. Krycek whirled around, gun pointing straight
between Mulder's eyes, before he'd completed his turn. Mulder
recoiled and put up his hands in a placating gesture. He
started to speak but before he could voice his questions, a
single bloodcurdling scream broke the silence and his heart. An
echo of pain, sharper and much more debilitating then before,
pulsed through him again.

GodMulderGodMulderGodMulderGodMulderGodMulderGodMulderGodMulder
GodMulder...

He could hear the broken litany of her fear and anger ringing
clearly in his head, even as the ghost-echo of her pain slowly
dissipated. Scared, and furious with the need to alleviate her
suffering, he broke into a run. Dashing headlong into the
darkness, he rushed along the corridor, rounded a corner and
flew down a set of stairs, down towards the bowels of the
building, where her scream had come from. He was absolutely
terrified; knowing Scully must be in extreme emotional distress
or pain for her to scream as she had just done. Guessing by the
pitch of her voice, it was the latter rather than the former.
He pushed aside his bitterness at the thought that he was more
adept at identifying anger or hurt in her voice than laughter
or happiness, and pressed on. At least they knew which way to
go to start looking for her now, and wouldn't be wandering
around here for hours trying to locate her. Shuddering at what
must have prompted the scream that had inadvertently provided
them with that fortunate advantage, he pressed on. He knew that
Scully wasn't a screamer, and the thought made his need to
hurry towards the sound of her voice that much more acute.
Sweat was in his eyes and her name was on his lips, as he tore
down another hallway, with no regard whatsoever for his own
safety.

Someone was there though to save him from himself, a task
Scully had willingly taken upon herself all those years ago. A
task which now, by some strange twist of faith, had once again
fallen to the man who had briefly tried to fill her shoes --
and failed -- when she'd been taken from him once before.

Krycek's hard body slammed into him from behind, and Mulder
found himself face down on the floor, pinned there by the man's
weight, and by a gun pressed into his face.

"Don't go stupid on me now, Mulder." The threat was undeniable;
if he didn't pull himself together, he'd find himself with a
bullet in the brain, faster than he could yell Scully's name.
Mulder quieted under the realization.

"I won't," he said, and meant it. "I'm okay. Now let me up."
The pressure at his temple eased, and Mulder climbed to his
feet, nodding at Krycek to assure him he'd regained his senses.

Pausing to catch his breath and gather his wits about him,
Mulder scanned the hallway and swung his gaze around just in
time to catch movement up ahead. Krycek was one step ahead of
him, pulling him against the wall and into a crouch. Darkness
and the boxes and crates lining the wall conspired to hide them
from sight.

Two figures emerged from a doorway at the end of the hall, one
male and one female, and Mulder watched them walk towards him,
then round a corner and disappear from his sight.

Voices floated back to him, getting fainter as they disappeared
down the hallway.

"You went too far, there's no rousing her now." The voice was
cultured, with a faint Southern drawl, and definitely feminine.

"I went just far enough," her male companion said. It was clear
from his tone of voice that he was smiling widely. "We'll let
her sleep it off for a bit, and when we come back and wake her,
she'll tell us everything we want to know. Just wait and see."

The words, and the cruel chuckle that followed, made Mulder's
blood boil, and he would have gone after them despite his
earlier promise, had Krycek not put a restraining hand on his
arm. The weight of it told Mulder it was his artificial one,
and the realization startled him enough to bring him out of his
red rage.

He cast a look in Krycek's direction, and what he saw there
shocked him almost as much as what he had just overheard. The
look on the man's faintly Slavic face mirrored his own. Fear
that they were already too late, anger at what they would find
had been done to Scully, and disgust at the cruel intent with
which it had obviously been done if the conversation they'd
just overheard was anything to go by.

Where his own face must clearly be registering his murderous
rage at what had been done to her, Krycek's gaze showed a
coldness that chilled Mulder to the core. The man's words were
shards of ice, falling to the floor in the space between them,
as he yanked Mulder with him and silently made for the door
that would lead them to Scully, rather than the hallway that
would lead to her captors.

"We go after HER first."

"Yeah," Mulder shook himself and then moved into position
behind Krycek. They silently hurried on towards their goal,
forcing themselves, despite their haste, to stop at every turn
and carefully scout out the terrain, before pressing on.

Nearing their destination, Mulder heard Krycek's voice floating
back to him, his whispered words eerily loud in the silence.
"Whatever state we find her in, don't fuck this up, Mulder. Our
first priority is to get her out of here."

Mulder nodded mutely then realized Krycek was in front of him
and breathed a soft,  "Yeah."

His assurances were forgotten faster than a politicians
promises after the votes have been cast, when they slipped into
the room and found her slumped over in a chair at the foot of a
flight of stairs. She was bound hand and foot, and the chair
she was bound to was standing smack dab in the middle of what
looked like a pool of blood.

She was not moving...

"Oh, Scully..." Mulder's voice broke on her name, and he barely
touched the stairs in his haste to get down, tripping over
himself and landing at her feet with a dull thud.

~>~>~>~>~>~><~<~<~<~<~<

CHAPTER 6

Krycek followed behind more slowly, his gaze sweeping the
basement, looking for hidden enemies and finding none, his ears
peeled for sounds coming from behind that would herald the
return of the man and woman they'd seen coming out of here. He
reached the bottom of the stairs, just as Mulder lurched to his
knees and carefully touched Scully's right hand.

Krycek swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry, and let his gaze
settle on their objective. Thinking of her in any other terms,
would surely, like Mulder, render him unable to think of
anything but slaughtering the butchers who'd done this to her.
Needing to stay alert and aloof, he hardened his heart,
allowing his eyes to travel up and down her form but keeping
his face carefully neutral.

Scully was slumped in the chair, head hanging down, curtain of
red hair obscuring her features. She was limp and unmoving; the
almost imperceptible rise and fall of her chest the only sign
she was still alive. The left side of her torso was stained red
with blood, and the cause was painfully clear. Two wickedly
long nails were driven into her, one through her hand, the tip
coming out through the other end of the wooden armrest, the
second impaling her shoulder, nailing it to the wood behind
her.

"Mulder," Krycek whispered, but received no response. He put
his hand out and touched the other man's shoulder, trying to
physically rouse him from the fugue-like state he'd fallen
into. Again, no response, save for an impatient shake of the
shoulder dislodging his hand.

Mulder's pain at seeing her in this condition was written
plainly upon his features. His face ghostly white, he was
softly chanting Scully's name, fingers drawing patterns on her
skin. Oblivious to anything but his partner's suffering, he was
fast becoming useless to their cause -- getting Scully out of
here.

"Mulder, listen to me," Krycek said, voice somewhere between a
whisper and a shout. "I need you to get a grip."

He wasn't getting through, Mulder's face was a blank mask of
horror, and his hands kept fluttering over Scully's still form,
tangling in her hair, touching her wrist, her face, anywhere
where it appeared safe to do so. As his fingers brushed over
her knee, she whimpered. Looking down at it, Krycek saw it was
swollen to twice its normal size.

At the fleeting pressure her partner's touch put on her injured
leg, Scully began to rouse with a low groan. Mulder startled
and fell back on his but with his own sharp movement. His mouth
opened and closed without words, voice stolen by the sight
before him. Krycek silently sympathized, but didn't let it
distract him from his goal.

"Mulder, snap out of it, she needs you," he said, and still
received no response. He tried more forcefully, "Come on my
friend, SCULLY needs you now."

The use of her name finally seemed to penetrate, and Mulder's
head swiveled in his direction. Krycek could hear the tendons
in his neck creak from where he stood several feet away. When
his eyes met the other man's haunted gaze, he saw the murderous
intent there.

"Mulder," he ground out, words like bullets spraying from his
lips, finding their target in the heart of the man sitting at
his feet. "They won't get away with this, I promise. But right
now, Scully should be your first priority."

A short nod and then the other man's eyes strayed once more to
his partner's form. He stroked the fine hairs at the back of
her neck, and swallowed audibly when she shifted slightly. Her
head rose and fell against the back of the chair, lolling
there, the fact that it stayed up indicating that she was
getting ready to wake up. For a moment, neither of them was in
a position to appreciate it though, as the damage done to her
face registered. Her right cheek was swollen and discolored. A
deep cut ran the length of her cheekbone, gaping open with the
swelling, blood coagulating at the edges.

Krycek cursed under his breath. Somehow, this, out of all she
had obviously suffered, seemed the worst kind of offence to
him, and a glance to his right confirmed Mulder felt the same.
That someone would have the gall to damage her beautiful face
was beyond incomprehensible.

Then her eyes fluttered; she seemed to be on the verge of
waking up, and he found himself holding his breath even as a
sharp hissing sound emanated from his companion.

"Mulder?" Her cracked voice sounded small in the deafening
silence that suddenly permeated the room.

"I'm here, Scully," Mulder whispered in her ear, so quietly
Krycek had to strain to hear him.

"Good, that's good." The words were no more than a breath,
softly leaving her body, but they clearly fuelled Mulder.

"Yeah." He drew up higher and pressed the softest of kisses to
her bruised cheekbone, and Krycek imagined he could hear her
sighing contently. He felt an unfamiliar emotion wash through
him, filling the empty places in his heart he hadn't realized
were empty. It took him a moment to identify the feeling as
jealousy.

Another sigh and Mulder sat back on his haunches, eyes riveted
on Scully's face, Krycek found himself similarly spellbound and
they waited with baited breath, but Scully was clearly not
awake yet. Her whispering Mulder's name and responding to him,
had been more an instinctual, primal, reaction than an
indication of her return to consciousness.

When Krycek's gaze shifted from her still face to Mulder's he
saw tears streaming down the other man's face as silent sobs
wracked his body. He understood, wishing he'd earned the right
to display such emotions over this woman, knowing he hadn't by
a long shot. He'd wronged her in too many ways. He'd let them
abduct her and kept silent while Mulder frantically searched
the heavens for a sign of her whereabouts. Had stood by and let
Cardinal shoot her sister. Had watched from the sidelines while
she took out her implant and nearly succumbed to cancer. Had
kept silent when a new chip was placed in her neck and she'd
almost died a fiery death when the callings began.

All the while, she'd never mistreated him, had looked outraged
on his behalf, on more than one occasion -- Mulder slapping him
just before they both wound up in Russia and he lost his arm
came to mind. Hell, she'd even shot her partner to keep Mulder
from killing his sorry ass once.

When he'd realized she was in danger again, and had grasped
what was at stake, he'd seized his chance this time to put
things right with her and even the score.

Being a man of favors owned and owed, if not of honor, he'd
been determined to help her.

He was not so delusional though, not to recognize that what
he'd done for her now, paled in comparison to everything he'd
done to her or hadn't done for her in the past.  He knew too,
that all his previous actions conspired to deny him the right
to express sympathy in the face of her distress now.

Instead, he tamped down on his feelings, and brutally grabbed a
hold of Mulder's arm, yanking him to his feet.

"She's gonna be waking up soon, Mulder. She does not need to
see you like this." His words were harsher than he'd intended,
but he managed to keep his tone carefully controlled. "I saw a
toolkit in the hallway, a few doors down. Go get it. We need
pliers or something to get her loose."

"I'm not leaving her."

"I understand how you feel, believe me I do." He hoped the
conviction in his voice and eyes would be enough to break
through the other man's deeply ingrained distrust of him, and
would let him see the sincerity of his words. Apparently it
did. Mulder's taut muscles relaxed slightly in his grip and his
gaze seemed to become a little clearer. "We need to get her
free of the chair, and you need to get yourself together,"
Krycek continued. When he saw Mulder nod in acceptance, he
breathed a sigh of relief.

A small movement from Scully drew both their gazes back to her
mangled body, and the urgency of her plight roused them both
into action at the same time.

Mulder got to his feet and, with a backward glance at Scully,
disappeared up the stairs and into the darkness beyond. Krycek
took his place at her side and watched her struggle to
awareness, the lines around her eyes and those between her
eyebrows deepening as bit by bit consciousness returned, and
with it the terrible pain he imagined she must be in.

Her reaction, when she finally woke up enough to be aware of
who was standing next to her, was not everything he could have
hoped for -- and yet at the same time it was.

"Krycek, what the hell are you doing here?" Her blue eyes were
fuzzy, but still sparked with anger and defiance. He felt an
answering surge somewhere deep inside of him, and was more than
a little surprised to find himself grinning madly at her. "I
should have known you were behind this," she continued, her
voice corrosive like acid.

For a brief moment, anger overshadowed her pain, and he was
absurdly grateful. Her eyes were blazing, her head was thrown
back, and he co