2/6/99 Crying Author- Araxdelan (krycekluvsmulder@hotmail.com) Rating- PG13 for Angst and Language Pairing- M/K Disclaimer- Dear Chris Carter, I write and read slash fanfiction where your pretty boys do pretty things. If you didn't want that happening, you shouldn't have put so much UST in the show. Love, Araxdelan Summary- Krycek's inner dialogues lead to self-judgment Notes- It all started as a snippet. Just the first paragraph, which I thought up one day while washing my own face. I built on that, and it took on a life of it's own. Beta by Lone Gungirl. Any mistakes remain out of my own stubbornness. =============================================== *********************************************** =============================================== I flee, to the bathroom. I turn on the cold faucet, letting it run until it's bitterly freezing, and splash it on my face. It trickles off my nose, down the drain. I feel it dripping from my lashes, falling down my face like tears. I remember crying, what it felt like to have the opportunity to be vulnerable, to allow weakness. I wish I could still cry, but I lost that ability long ago, like many other parts of my humanity. If I could only cry... Such simple luxuries as this one are denied to me. I've grown used to it for the most part, but there are still days, days where I feel like I am lost. Days when I feel like there is nothing left of me, that I am just an empty shell, a robot doing what it is told. It's days like this when my own end seems in sight; when, for a few moments, I stop. Just stop, give up, let things fall where they may, and if I die, so be it. These spats of bleakness never last very long though, my survival instinct is stronger than it seems. But nevertheless, I treasure these moments, for they are when my humanity burns brightest, and I am owned by no one. I see clearly, see the things I've done, and the things I shouldn't have done. I count my regrets, and include him, my love, my beauty, my heart. I didn't even know how I felt of him, until the first time I gave up. It was then that things came into focus. //You're a bad person, Alexei. You've done terrible things... what makes you think you deserve to live? And what about him?// "Who?" I had asked myself, for I was quite sure I had lost the capacity to care for anyone but me. //Mulder.// part of me (I believe my conscience) replied. "Mulder?!!" I said, "What the hell does Mulder have to do with anything?" //Don't you see? Mulder *is* everything! Mulder is what you were. He's the truth and the light, he's morals and goodness, he's everything you can never be again. He has *emotions*. Real ones, all the time. He's not putting on an act for everybody, like you. Do you remember when you had emotions Alexei? Do you remember when you wore them on the outside for everyone to see? Do you remember when you'd yell when you were angry, cry when you were sad, and smile for a reason that had nothing to do with averting death, or conversely, reigning it down upon your foes?// "I was weak. Mulder is weak. He will die and I will live." //Mulder isn't weak, he's *human*. And he's been through a hell of a lot, and you've contributed to that. He's *strong* Alexei. It's his emotions that make him strong. He has something pulling him. He has a purpose. What's your purpose?// "To survive." //Wouldn't it be easier to survive outside the game?// "I can't leave the game." //Then why not switch sides?// "Join up with Mulder? Even if he's let me, we both know that the other side is more dangerous." //Alexei... no matter what side you're on, your death is immanent. At least death on their side is death with honor.// At that point, I was left speechless. My little inner dialogue had given me insight on myself, insight I would never have stumbled upon during times when I had a tighter grasp on sanity. I realized I was foolish, but I had no way, no way to go back to change things. Once a fool, always a fool. Left with no other options, I continued on. More death, more betrayal. It was all I knew, and therefore, all I'd ever know. During subsequent times of duress, I had more of these inner dialogues. The dialogues made me realize just how much I despised myself, and how much I envied Mulder. Perhaps this envy for his ability to shine through tragedy grew to respect, and this respect into love. It's not hard to love someone like that. Someone true and pure, funny and intelligent, someone who harkens back to what I was before this life overcame me. //You had the chance to be like him.// my conscience once said. "When? Before I got roped into all of this?" //No, back when they assigned you as his partner.// "Bullshit." //You did! You even thought about it at times. You wanted to tell him everything, to tell him why you where there, what they did to you, what they wanted you to do to him. You may not remember it, but you thought these things. And then you chastised yourself for being weak. That's how all this started, you know. You told yourself that to beat them, you would have to be strong, that you couldn't give in to anyone. Not even him. His royal loveliness, prince of the truth. You couldn't give into his charms. No. You had to play *their* game, so you could get out, one day, even if it meant sacrificing...// "No! Stop it! I was just a child in a game of men! How was I to know where it would lead?! It's not my fault, it's not!" //It isn't? When you had the answer before you, and you ignored it? When you closed your eyes to the crimes you were committing, because you thought they were essential to your survival? When you killed the father of a man you respected, you loved, to save yourself?// I tired to kill myself that night. The truth hurts, and I think that's something that Mulder fails to examine. If he found the truth, would he be able to handle it? I know but pieces of the real puzzle, and it frightens me. I've found pieces of my own puzzle, and it's nearly led to my death. Mulder expects the truth to conveniently coincide with his personal objectives. So did I. But the truth changes for no man. Not even *them*. Oh, they may bend the truth, morph it into something else, but at that point, it ceases to be the truth. I discovered I have no reason to be alive anymore. I won't bend things to make it seem different. I'm nothing anymore, but a rat bastard who would destroy anyone to get out of the mess he's gotten himself into. And I don't know what this means for me. I have no reason to live, no humanity, no scruples. What should I do? Should I kill myself? Should I continue on the way I am, doing the things I do, because it's the only thing I can do? //Go to your light. Run towards it, lose yourself in it, he's the only thing that can save you...// I wipe the water from my face, the "tears", along with any scrap of emotion that might have escaped, and walk back into my reality. The End Visit my fanfiction (Lone Gungirl's too!) at- Araxdelan's Slash Site http://www.members.tripod.com/Araxdelan/