Subject: Uncharted Territory (1/1) From: rosesdecay@aol.com (RosesDecay) Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Title: Uncharted Territory Author: RosesDecay E-Mail address: RosesDecay@aol.com Rating: R for adult situations Category: VA Spoilers: The Red And The Black Keywords: Pseudo-slash Summary: Krycek observes Mulder after he leaves. Disclaimer: The X-Files and all characters related to the show do not belong to me. I don't claim any right to them. No infringement intended. ~ Uncharted Territory ~ All is not right in Mulder-Ville tonight. My flesh is crawling with invisible ants. My joints are trembling, as if I have been released of a tremendous burden that I'm not quite aware is gone. Imprinted onto my lips are the grooves of stubble. Across the tip of my tongue dances the acrid taste of ash. Inside the darkened room, Mulder has trouble aiming the gun away from himself. I watch silently as he sets it down on the couch, only to sweep it back up seconds later to rest in his lap. His fingers move, feather-like, over the trigger, wondering if one wrong move will set it off. The barrel is pointed at his belly, but each touch knocks it ajar. It points to the window now, to the kitchen, to me. He picks it up again, testing it's weight, bouncing it with his wrist. The barrel pokes at his chin, his cheek, his heart. He is not the Mulder I remember, the Mulder who expressed his emotions with punches and kicks. That Mulder would have already been three feet away when I pounced. That Mulder would have ripped my sorry excuse for a prosthetic off and had me skewered like a shish kebab without batting an eye. That Mulder would never have taken defeat so easily. This Mulder, the one who sits inside the darkness playing some twisted combination of Chicken and Russian Roulette, is all wrong. Lost. I touch my lips carefully, feeling the pinpricks. He laughed at me. I gave him the biggest lead he ever dreamed of and he laughed. Thought I was kidding. If there's one thing Mulder should have learned over the years, it's that I don't kid around. Not when the stakes are this high. He lets the gun test the flexibility of his outer ear. I stare at him silently, wondering if he can feel the sharp heat drumming against his closed eyelids. He lifts the gun as if in response, tracing an arc over his forehead, bumping it over his nose. For a moment he pauses, until he slowly draws it over to an invisible spot on his cheek. The kiss had been hard but left no mark. Perhaps the spasmodic jerks of nerves still dance in that spot. Perhaps he can still feel the flush of hot breath, the softness of lips. Perhaps he is just guessing. The gun zeroes in on the point and stays firmly in place. Already I can hear the efficient click-clacks of the wheels in his mind. Silently, he rationalizes and justifies the kiss, giving it a name and a textbook meaning. Kiss of farewell. Kiss of betrayal. Kiss of death. Kiss of lust, kiss of love? His mind skips over those neatly. I am the Enemy. The Enemy neither lusts nor loves. I am nothing more than a man with a personal agenda, trying to save my own skin and get ahead in the Game. My lips burn, craving another taste. Part of me regrets the fast and sudden harshness of it. I gave him no time to react or respond, to yield or fight. That part of me yearns to know whether or not I would have won him over had I lingered. Mulder drops the gun to the couch. Keeping his eyes safely closed, he touches the spot on his cheek. His index finger pinpoints the spot, his other fingers splaying in wonderment. His eyes strain against their lids. Does he wonder as well? If I had only held on longer. Would the gentle prickle on my lips have changed to a scrape as he turned his neck? Would parched lips have enveloped my own, easing them open with the damp flick of a tongue? I had given him the gun too soon, trusted him with my life too fast. I crave much more than a brush of the lips, but my opportunity - what looks like the final opportunity - has come and gone. His hand drifts towards the gun again and my stomach twists into a strange knot. He picks it up and raises it to eye level, though his eyes remain solidly shut. He lowers it a bit, until the barrel rests softly upon his lower lip. I panicked, and my opportunity was gone. It could have been me inside, resting upon his lips, exploring his sharp contours. My hands itch for his slickness, my mouth for his tongue, but instead I remain outside. Watching him draw his lips obscenely around the gun, returning a kiss he could not bring himself to define. His finger wraps around the trigger almost lazily. My heart jumps. It is now, I realize, that it ends. If I enter, he will kill me. I'm sure of it. If I stay outside, lust be damned. He won't have a skull anymore. Part of me tries to jump, tries to scream. To stop him before it's too late. But I don't move. In the end, it will always be me, my skin, my agenda. Love and lust can be sacrificed. I can't. A knock on the door startles me more than Mulder. His hands go slack and the gun slips through his lips with a wet pop. His eyes open. I hear the sound of Scully's voice through the door. Mulder seems not to hear it, staring in unmasked astonishment at the gun in his lap. A switch has been flipped; the tracks of his mind are elsewhere. The wheels click in his mind, rationalizing and denying. Moving on. It's time for me to move on as well. It's time to flee again, to slink back to the shadows. Disaster averted. Another opportunity gained. Pinpricks pepper my lips as I begin to run. Again. ~ Like any uncharted territory I must seem greatly intriguing You speak of my love like You have experienced Love like mine before - "Uninvited"