Time by Te 5/98 Disclaimers: Still not mine, but I'm being awful good this year. Spoilers: Just whose fic do you think you're *reading*? Ratings Note: R for language, violence, and some... stuff. Archiving Information: Ask first. Author's Note: Another day, another challenge. I sincerely doubt you expected this when you made it, though, Alicia. Also, this is a possible sequel to a work-in-progress. Of course, I wouldn't be posting this if it couldn't be read alone. Acknowledgments: For Sister Blue, 'cause you're the greatest thing that's ever happened to me. Thanks go to Alicia for suffering the trial that is beta reading for me, as well as to CiCi and Dawn for many helpful comments and encouragements. Please send any and all feedback to Daddy793@aol.com. Time by Te ****** Just as the grave reached the mandatory minimum depth of three feet his trowel broke. Alex would have to cover the body by hand. It was a sign, he supposed. Yet more proof that it //was a failure// was time to change tactics. Alex shuddered minutely in the rain, not at all amused by the irony of the fact that he only felt its chill with the flush of the kill fresh on his skin. He watched incuriously as the //pissing// rain cut moon bright tracks through the spatters of mud that had accumulated on the pale flesh of his victim while he dug. Another problem. A "warm" winter in northern Massachusetts meant there had been weeks of this rain, and the Rules forbade the collection of any of the effects of a //happy this one had been happy to see me... even happier when he found out the truth...// meal in one's chosen lair -- even if only until they dried to a burnable state. Mr. Francis P. Humboldt, late of Pittsfield, would simply have to be buried in his clothes. Despite having taken the precaution of severing //Please, Alex... call me// Frankie's head clear from his body to hide any suspicious marks, it was a worrisome thing. Should the rain continue (as it was showing every sign of wanting to do), it was entirely possible that the earth would shift enough to make for a far too early discovery of the body. There was nothing for it. Alex would *have* to take the wallet, the earrings. He would have to //I don't care what you do, boy, so long as you// do what was necessary. He pulled out his machete. The thuds of metal on cold meat, the tink tink of wood on bone and enamel... nonsensical sounds that did little, really, to break up the numbing monotony of watery patters. It was all very depressing, and he knew there would be little comfort at home. ****** The cabin was just outside of Bennington, all weather- proofed decks and artfully landscaped grounds. All but useless and disturbingly barren this time of year, of course, and the Realtor had seemed more shocked that the two men wanted to rent the place than he had at their stubborn refusal to set an appointment before 6 p.m. In the end, however, the papers had been signed and the house was theirs for six months. Alex stood on the side deck for several moments in a futile attempt to //avoid the inevitable// allow Mother Nature to wash the worst of the mud from his body. Mulder had the fireplace lit. Again. Another argument Alex had hastily conceded when //I need it, damn you! I'm so damn cold all the time and it's *your* fault...// *that* look had stolen over his lover's eyes... Flare of gold in //Always and forever...// moonlight, deceptive, a lie of wildness and vitality that he'd fallen in love with that First Night they'd been together, blood black tacky on their lips in the glare of hopelessly banal neon... salt and copper no, that was wrong, it was iron old and strong and true but it hadn't lasted long before he knew what it truly portended... useless, and now, two years later, near constant despair. Alex watched the pungent smoke spiral raggedly into the blankly grey sky. The rain was too weak to be satisfying, and it sliced the ephemeral elegance of the plume to tatters, but as a drop slid down the crevice between nose and cheekbone he decided that the illusion of tears was fitting. He was well and truly sodden, though, and after another several minutes he went inside. Mulder was in his usual place, a bare three feet from the //Listen and well, Alexei, this is the most important of the Rules: There are still a number of things that can kill you in this world but only this can make it *hurt*. // fire, humped and muddled beneath a pile of quilts. Alex knew he had to be uncomfortable, but had long since given up on reasoning with the man. In the old days //It wasn't supposed to be like this...// simple misdirection had worked. Shamelessly bad jokes, the most bizarre seductions //Always young, always *strong,* dammit...// he could come up with... diversions like that night at the porn theater gorging, glutting themselves on the desperate and perverse and oh it was even better when they were dirty and strange hints and images of petty sins committed in sweaty abasements to Asmodeus and if they were hard as diamond some freakish negative of obsidian at the dark little fantasies of sons and daughters taut and //so precious...// constrained swallowed down with the life the blood well, weren't they doing a public service? Alex shook off his thoughts and gazed at his companion again. He hadn't moved or done anything to acknowledge Alex's presence. "I'm going to take a shower." Silence. "Care to join me?" //C'mon, remember the bathtub at least...// "It won't work, Alex. You know we'll never be clean again." //Christ, not *this* again.// "Mulder... Mulder, I didn't force this on you. You asked -- *begged*-- me for it. It's too fuck--" The older man didn't bother to turn. "Fucking late for guilt. For you, maybe. You ought to know by now that it's never too late for me, *Alex.*" "Oh, of *course* not. Not for you. Poor Saint Fox, sins of the whole wide world on your shoulders. Well I'm fucking sick of it, Mulder. Guilt I could handle. That much I expected from you. But I've been thinking--" "Did it hurt?" "Shut the fuck up. Just be quiet for a little while and listen //And well.// while I break a few things down for you. You're quite good at it, after all, giving me your back night after goddamn ni--" "Just say it, damn you!" Alex closed his mouth abruptly, long since accustomed to the lack of a click and absentmindedly lapping the two small drops of blood from his lower lip. He *had* been babbling, he supposed. "Fine. Here it is. You had made your decision long before you tracked me down that night. Sometimes I think you'd made it years before we ever met. If you ever got a chance, a *real* chance for... power, maybe? Or just to leave the world behind?" No answer. "Whatever. If you ever got the chance you would take it, no questions asked. And so you did. And it was sweet in the beginning, Mulder. You can't tell me it wasn't. We gave each other *all* of each other that night and again and again after that whenever--" "Just get to the point, Alex." //So tired... we don't have to be like this...// "Just let me finish, will you?" A //Impatient? Uncomfortable?// shift under the blankets was Alex's only answer. "Taking Them out. One by one. Quick or slow, however you wanted and I watched you smile, Mulder. I know, dammit I *know* you were happy. But then it changed. You stopped laughing and I called it boredom. Stopped hunting and I blamed fatigue and I brought you victims. I did everything I could to make you happy again and..." Late August and he'd passed by a puppy farm. Hadn't fed and it was a maddening buzz under the flesh but he'd seen them. Twin Akitas. Pure black... winsome and fine in the West Virginia starlight bounding and yipping and tumbling and he'd demanded the breeder let him buy them Right Now. Bram and Camilla. Ludicrous perfection in silken fur... "And sometimes it //worked for a while... until you just plain stopped feeding...// worked. That's how I know it wasn't really guilt, //You were lean... bones showing through, veins sickly blue even in the dimmest light. I'd decided to let you starve the ennui out of your system,// Mulder. If it was I would've seen it earlier. We wouldn't have had the good times..." //too late too late I could hear the whimpered screams too damn human but not enough for me to drown them out as irrelevant as meat for the beast and there was... matter... all over our beautiful little apartment and Camilla was trying to kick but you had her by the throat... worrying...// The memory was still powerful. Still shocking, foul, despite the passage of time. Alex had loved them in his way. But, as with everything unpleasant, it had its uses. It hardened him. "And, really, that's what pisses me off, Mulder. The fact that you would cloak yourself in this lying, *puling* imitation of shame. Don't you at least have the good fucking grace to tell me what's really wrong?" He didn't really expect anything like a real answer, but the insult had the desired effect of getting the man to *move*. And he quickly regretted it. Mulder stood and shrugged off the blankets, revealing the black jeans and t-shirt he'd been wearing for far too many days. Then he turned. The hours before the fire had left his //beautiful...// face blistering and burnt, not the red of healthy, living flesh, but charred. "Oh Christ, Mulder, why do--" "You wanted to know why, Alex? I miss the sun. Plain and simple. I. Miss. The. Sun." Alex couldn't help but snort a little at the thought. "Do you really expect me to believe this... *this* is all over some hot fucking ball in the sky? It's not like you were ever a sand- between-your-toes kinda guy, Mulder. Wha- -" "That's just it, Alex. Regret." Alex watched the other man raise too-thin hands to his face, wincing a little in sympathy at the sharp hiss of pain as fingertips brushed new scars. The blood would heal it but... He schooled his voice to gentleness. "Why?" "It's that hoary old cliche. You never know what you have until you lose it. And it's gone. I'll never watch that play of light and shadow under a dogwood in May. Never sweat in July." He snorted without amusement and plucked a bit of skin from his cheek. "Never get a fucking tan." It was flippant, but Alex could hear the truth behind the self-mockery. He remembered those two short weeks between finals and graduation. Beautiful weather and all you needed to make the day perfect were a keg, a hibachi, and "Cinnamon Girl" on the stereo. And the late afternoon sunlight was *just* that shade of burnished gold and the world was right. Could it... "Don't say never, Mulder. You... I've heard rumors. Old ones. Powerful enough to face the dawn..." Alex watched the hazel eyes narrow in suspicion, but, so far as he knew, he was telling the truth. "We can have forever, Mulder. But we'll have change as well, don't you see? We just have to be..." //strong// "... a little patient. Can you do that with me? For me?" Alex walked slowly, carefully to his lover and bared his own throat. "Please, Mulder. We have all the time in the world..." He closed his eyes. And waited. A soft brush of lips and the ghost of tears that really would never, could never, be shed again. And when the pain came it was beautiful, and oh, so right. End ***** Note: The challenge in question? I had mentioned offhand that I couldn't really see the fellas doing something as normal and benign as adopting a puppy. Alicia challenged me to write a scenario where it happened. Here ya go, babe.