************* Part 5/? ---------- Part Five "This is it?" It was just a regular looking building. It could have been anything. Of course it was also twenty miles away from a paved road and in the middle of one of the densest forests Sam had ever seen--but still. It was so *ordinary*. Scully and Byers looked at him. "What did you expect, a big sign that said 'Secret Military Installation: Now Hiring'," Scully asked with a hint of disdain. Well, it would have made the whole thing easier to comprehend. Or maybe not. Byers frowned through his binoculars. "Frohike said they've been conducting tests on people with extraordinary mental ability here for almost fifty years. Started after the Hannlin case in Missouri--" "Not the one with the flying knives," Scully groaned. "What...like Carrie," Sam asked. Scully and Byers just looked at him. Again. "Anyway," Byers continued, "this has been kind of a light house for psychics, clairvoyants, telekinetics, psychokinetics, telepaths--" "Right up Mulder's alley," Scully muttered. Sam frowned. "I don't get it." He thought Mulder was interested in government conspiracies and cover-ups. And aliens. Oh my. This time Byers and Scully just exchanged tired glances. "Do they come here willingly or are they forced to conduct tests," Scully asked. Byers gave her a knowing look. "Langly," He began quietly, "Langly knew a guy who came out of here. He was a brilliant engineer. Computer science. He used to worked on the project to fix the Millennium bug. Wouldn't talk about it." This time Scully and Sam exchanged glances. "Was," they asked. Byers shivered slightly. The sun was beginning to set and the wind was picking up. It looked like rain, even felt like rain. But none of those reasons had caused the chill. "It's just...gone. Everything he knew about computers. He can still remember how to drive a car and do *almost* everything he could before, but now...he can't even turn a computer *on*. Some kind of selective amnesia." Scully closed her eyes. Sam decided it was time to distract her (and himself) with another annoying question. "What about the name?" "The name," Scully repeated distractedly, taking the binoculars from Byers. "Victoria Falls. I wonder if there's a hidden meaning there. It's also the name of the waterfall in Africa, named after Queen Victoria. And a part of Antarctica is also named Victoria." Byers seemed to chew on that. "I can't think of a connection. Scully?" She lowered the binoculars slowly and stared at the simple white office building. "Mulder would know." Yeah, Sam thought. Mulder *would* know. -------- Robert had fallen asleep sitting upright in a chair (he thought he would just 'rest his eyes for a moment') when he felt something pressing at his throat and the cold steel of the gun at his temple. His eyes fluttered open and standing in his pathetic little cube of a room stood Alex Krycek. Dressed all in black, of course. "Do you mind?" The *plastic* hand at this throat tightened. "Not at all, *Bobby*." "What is this about?" Krycek ignored him. "Okay," Robert amended, "*Why* are you involved?" The funny thing was-- "Does it matter?" "No," Robert said with a grin. Krycek almost returned it and looked annoyed. Whether he was annoyed with Robert or himself, Robert couldn't tell. The funny thing was, they had always *liked* each other. Similar senses of humor--different philosophies. Krycek loosened his grip and kicked out a chair from the table. As he sat down, the gun was lowered, but kept in plain sight. Like a reminder. A reminder that Krycek was fully capable of killing him. And they both knew it. "I'm always amazed at how badly they peg you." Robert didn't say anything. "Every *device* and *drug* imaginable at you disposal and you use *reasoning*. You and I both know that nothing short of the equivalent to OF an *Atomic* psychic bomb is going to get the answers they want from Mulder. Two days now and you've gotten nothing." "I find reasoning is a more effective tool--" "No, you don't." Krycek shook his head, and caught his eyes. "You just don't have the metal to torture him. To get what you need from him, no matter the method or result." And strangely Krycek knew him better than anyone else--even his wife. "Would you?" Krycek didn't answer his soft question. "If you were in my place--" "It's *irrelevant* whether *I* would--" Robert laughed suddenly. "Isn't it always?" Krycek moved his jaw. It looked painful. "What is going on here? Why you? And why are you going about this, in *this* manner?" "Somehow I have acquired a reputation for ruthlessness I don't actually deserve. Can't imagine how I got it either." He stared at Krycek pointedly. The other man actually seemed to blanch. "They seem to think that I have the talent and the pure ambition to get the answers from Mulder." "Your ambition had been proven," Krycek answered coldly. Robert just looked at him. "Gee, we don't happen to know anybody--*ambitious* do we? Somebody who would do anything--*anything*--to get what she wanted? Even use her husband--a doctor--to her advantage." Silence followed his sharply bitten off words. "So--the experiments--the tests..." Krycek had no expression on his face. Robert shook his head. "Not me. Did you really believe that of me?" "Honestly? I thought you would do anything for her." His look around the room was more than a little ironic. "Almost anything." Krycek seemed to think about that. "Why isn't she here?" "Suddenly Marita has developed a conscience. Or else she's afraid to take the blame for something *she* knows is impossible. I get the feeling--there's a kind of...I don't know...trap waiting in there." "In there?" "In Mulder's mind." Krycek put the safety on the gun and tucked it slowly and carefully in his pants pocket. "How can you be sure?" Robert smiled slowly. "You just told me. Your group wouldn't have placed him in a situation where he could get well, unless you were damn sure nothing more could be gained from him. So, we can get his impressions of the actual process where he was exposed to the--virus--and even the emotions associated with the entire experience, perhaps even the later painful attempts to retrieve any information by your guys--but other than that--" "Nada," Krycek finished calmly. "Right." Krycek walked over to his bed and flipped casually through the mythic file. Not looking up he said, "So why are you still here? For her?" He swallowed. "They'll kill her and me, of course. *When* I fail. I guess I'm buying time. Till I can figure a way to get out of this--*with* Mulder." Krycek sighed. "You know you could have gotten out of here at any time. Just not with Mulder. Or Marita. Acceptable losses, Robert." "The only thing I have, that I can hold on to...is that I'm still a *doctor*. I can still *try* to help people. Even if I fail, at least I know I'll have tried. What about you? Mulder is useless." "He usually is." A faint smile played across the assassin's face. "Orders are orders." "If this was an order sanctioned by the group, *you* wouldn't be bird-dogging it alone, Krycek." "This isn't from the entire group. The 'group' doesn't exist anymore. It never did, not really." Robert hesitated. "If we leave with you--what are our chances?" They looked at each other. Even after everything, the inherent honesty between them had never truly been damaged. A quiet miracle considering the world they moved within and the life each led. "House always wins, Bobby. Maybe we can just run around 'em this time, though." Maybe, Robert thought. But doubtful. --------- Interlude -------- He was. Salt and Smoke. He was watching the grey whitecaps on Martha's vineyard. The salty smell of the sea air, which led him to the smell of his father's hands on his head just before bed and the trace of salt always present on them. The constant sunflower seeds around his father's desk. The dark mahogany color of the wood. The same color as Merry Bradford's eyes. At the junior dance and later the beach beneath them, the starry night a blanket above them. The way his tuxedo choked him. Her emerald green dress. That terrible green suit another woman had worn only once in his presence and only that first year. The Honeymoon year. Finding the best fit with each other. Discovering that were was no best fist. Her blue eyes. Her rare smile. The Honeymoon year. Never would it be like that. Mourning. For that year, for that woman. Mourning. For Samantha. For himself. Sam always behind him, as he would be the one to forge ahead, always making sure she hadn't fallen too far behind. He remembered she never caught up with him. Always being the one to forge ahead. The white caste enclosing her shoulder, encasing her, practically putting her away on a shelf for the summer. The many trophies on his own shelf. Basketball and track. Running the long yellow track, the true meaning of long distance runner, the agony of that last mile and the ecstasy of breaking the ribbon. Breaking Diana's goblet in the fireplace as they toasted graduation from the academy. Making love on lazy Sunday afternoons, that bed, that room the only place existing at that moment. Then spreading the Washington Post out over the bed, arguing over who got which section. The first time his name was in the paper. Finding the article months later in a drawer where Diana had saved it. Burning it. The smell as it burned. Burning cigarettes. Salt and smoke. Two men. His mother. A burning cigarette. He dully noticed the spattered blood against the door. The silent guard was still silent. As we would be forever. The tall, gaunt man walked through the tainted doorway, the cigarette in his long bony fingers. He was grey. Lacking color, lacking a visible soul. He had never feared the color of his own soul. Black or white, it was never grey. He knew that know. He knew. "Did you do this," he whispered. He sat on the grey bed. In this grey world. Grey that wasn't a mixture of black and white, but true ambiguity. "The faith you place in me," the older man said, his mouth curving. Faith. What an evil, deceiving state to be in. He stood blocking the doorway. Tall and imposing. An unspoken threat. You little spy. And then he stood aside. Deliberately. The door was there, empty. No presence. Nothing between him and...the world. The world. What a simple word for such a complex heaven and hell. Had anyone ever truly understood the tragedy of it all, the grace? He was being give a chance though. To understand. Their eyes locked and he felt a muscle in his cheek tremble. Smoke in the air and salt in his throat. END Part 5/?