The Devil's Own

The ticking of the clock drew him up the first time, aggravating him with the irregular beat -- or he was fading in and out?  It was too hot; he was sure of that much.  He reached for something to help him claw his way out of the fog in his skull and found wood and leather against his skin, a framework under him, padded straps binding him to it, but nothing else.  The air burned in his lungs, chokingly full of some scent that coated his throat.  It hurt to breathe, inside and out.  A swirling gust of incense spun across his face and he lost himself again before he found his name, or where he was, or why.

Drumbeats brought him back the second time, monotonously steady.  There was no joy in the rhythm, no call to dance or fight.  The tempo beat slowly, droning and dragging his heartbeat down with it.  The incense had drifted away, though, and he could almost think.  His name surfaced, followed immediately by a worry both instinctive and reasoned:  when, and how, and above all why, had he lost his clothes?

Alex ached all over, with bruises and the sharper aches of deep cuts laying their own notes over the throbbing in his head.  Straps cut into his chest, his wrist, his shins, and he flexed his feet and hand reflexively, pushing the blood along while making sure none of his fingers were broken.  Now he could feel his ribs twinge in an all-too-familiar way that told him they were cracked and needed to be taped soon.  Worse, his thoughts kept slowing.  Beaten and drugged, then.  It felt like he'd given someone a fight to capture him, and maybe a second fight when they thought he was already unconscious.

Most importantly right now, though, he was strapped to some kind of framework and whoever had done it was a thorough, paranoid bastard.  Alex probably had managed that second fight.  He could feel leather around his ankles, above his knees, across his hipbones, under his armpits, above his elbow, at his wrist, and along each finger and his thumb.  They'd even strapped down his stump, and another strap kept his head from nodding forward.  I'm standing... wonder if this pivots back?  And they've left the major veins exposed.  Whatever they're doing, it doesn't need an intact sacrifice, apparently.  Wonder if they'd have killed me or just dumped me somewhere, soaked in alcohol... fucking Smoker--

He shut that thought down, reaching for what information he could get before he admitted he was awake.  Red light flickered and danced, visible even through closed eyes, and he could smell wood smoke under the cloying scent hovering around him.  Outside was the cacophony of a cresting storm, sleet and hail ticking against glass and thunder rumbling low in the distance.

If he could get free, though, they'd never track him.  If they did, they wouldn't live through him and the storm both.  If he could get free.  If he could make it out the door without being tackled again.  If he could find a way to survive the storm himself, anyway.  Unguarded breaths were flashes of light and pain to match the lightning strikes outside.  Strapped down like this, Alex wouldn't have wanted to bet on himself to win.  Yet.

Alex opened his eyes; he couldn't hear anyone nearby.  Lightning flashed somewhere to his right, momentarily illuminating the room.  The floors were hardwood, stained some dark shade and polished to a high gleam.  A thick, slick line curved around him in that wood -- inlaid in some material, apparently -- with a candelabrum in front of him.  Then the lightning was gone and all Krycek had left was light-shot vision that too slowly reformed into firelight dancing across the room.  A few low-watt lamps glowed on the wall, all covered with red shades that would have gone well in a 19th century brothel.  The circle around him was in red, as well; the candles were black.

Whatever he was strapped to stopped about four feet off the ground, judging by the occasional breeze of blessedly cool air hitting his back.  He was naked and far too hot; either he was feverish, or someone was burning a lot of fuel to counter England's usual chill.  Assuming I'm still in England, Alex thought and added this fuck-up to the Smoker's ledger.  He'd been told that investigating Heath Butler would be a simple reconnaissance and seduction.  Apparently not.

Turning his head took more effort than he liked, but the sweat beading his forehead slicked the leather enough to make it barely manageable.  The room had been a ballroom once; he was on some grand estate, by the proportions of the room and the French doors off to his right.  They might still open.  From the sounds, open ground lay beyond them.  Strong winds and rain drove small branches and leaves against the glass now in addition to the sleet.  What little he could see of the walls made him think they were wallpapered, not painted, and it wasn't peeling.  Great.  Some asshole -- hopefully his target, or this was going to be a complete loss -- had turned a country estate into a laboratory for black magic....  And I'm tied down.  Shit.

"Fuck.  How long have I been out?"  He kept his voice to a mutter on general principles, and the words in Russian, just in case there were microphones.

"About three hours, darling."  A husky female voice answered his rhetorical question, and her accent made him even more tense for a brief moment; she sounded like expensive caviar, good vodka, and high Party affiliations.  "You missed the salt and water, the incense, the dreadful poetry for the invocation, and a few other highlights I'm going to geld them for."  The tone was light but the threat still sounded real.

"So what is going on?"  Alex kept his voice level, putting aside his knowledge of the estate owner's predilections.  "And who are you?"

"Judging by the preliminaries, this idiot thinks he can practice black magic and we're the practice exercises.  And you can call me Amanda, gorgeous.  At least, I suspect you're usually gorgeous.  You were a little bloody when they brought you in."

"Great."  Alex pressed harder against the leather holding him in place.  The double doors into the rest of the house were closed, but he didn't like the look of the knives hung on the walls on either side.  More candelabra, farther from his sight this time, which meant the pentagram was pointing....  It took longer to remember the estate layout than it should have -- assuming he was still on Butler's land.  "He's got the pentacle pointing north."

"Mm-hmm.  I did say black magic," Amanda said, but she sounded distracted.

"How tightly do they have you strapped in?  And where'd you learn Russian?"  Alex was fighting the straps on his arm, using his stump for leverage.  More damage to that arm would hardly matter, and getting out of here was now the priority.

"Russians appreciate a circus properly," she said absently.  "I'm afraid they got a little thorough about wrapping me up; I annoyed them.  This could take me a while.  So what were you doing here?"

"Not volunteering for this," Alex said grimly.  The headache from whatever they'd used to knock him out kept throbbing through his temples, spikes of black and white pain running through his head and down his nerves.  The periodic flashes of lightning shot his night sight, adding to the pain, and left static hissing along too many exposed fine hairs.

"You do sound a little smarter than that," was the dry reply.  "Do you know anything about black magic?"

"I know it might work," Alex said, sagging into the leather for a moment as he caught his breath.  "And I'm not interested in being the sacrifice.  You?"

"Mmm."  She hissed in frustration.  "That didn't work....  Oh, bits and pieces.  This and that.  If I could just get my hands free!"

Alex was slick with sweat now, and blood was trickling around his wrist, but it wasn't enough to get free.  He sagged again, panting despite the pain around his lungs.  "Fuck.  I don't suppose anyone will come looking for you?"

She sounded no happier than he felt.  "In time?  Maybe.  If we're lucky.  I don't suppose anyone will come looking for you?"

Alex's laughter tasted bitter with rage directed both inward and outward.  "Not in time."

"Mmm.  That's not good."  She paused for a long moment, gasped softly, then mentioned, "I hate to add to the mood, but you should know in advance:  Butler likes men better than women."

"Yeah, I know."  Alex shrugged, trying to catch his breath before he started twisting against the leather again.  "So we're still on his land?"

"You thought they'd moved you, or they did move you?" Amanda asked, before cursing with startling fluency from someone with that accent.  She accused the guards of tastes that started with a preference for oral sex from minks and ran rapidly downhill into profanity Alex hadn't heard since his grandfather died.

When she finally quit, Alex didn't waste his breath asking her what hadn't worked.  He didn't bother to curse, either:  that would be later, when the pain began.  "I thought they had moved me.  You think we're looking at being raped and killed, then?"

"Mmm.  Torture's likely.  Well, from our point of view.  I'm sure they'll think of it as blooding us to power the spell.  Oh, and Butler seems to think he has to do the ceremony in meter and he can't write poetry to save his life or ours.  If you consider that torture."

"I have a tin ear for verse," Alex said dryly.

"Lucky you."

The drumbeat cut off abruptly and Alex muttered, "Taped drums?  He is an amateur, isn't he?"

Amanda sighed and murmured, "Really, I think he's just cheap."

Alex was still grinning when the robed figures threw open the doors to the ballroom with a booming thud that was meant to sound impressive.  Amanda's sotto voce commentary on the costs of good plasterers and replacing the wallpaper took away from the intended effect nicely, though.

Even before he saw how careful the magicians were around the edges of the circle, however, the breeze swirling through the room caught Alex's attention.  The patterns were wrong, and he didn't know why, but he didn't question his instincts either.  There were spots of... resistance, places where the cooler air from the hallway billowed and eddied around nothingness.  What it meant, he didn't know, but right then Krycek would have loved to be in the United States, where he could be sure that somehow, some way, through inexplicable hunches and guesswork, Mulder would show up.  Then he'd only have to take a few more punches from Mulder to get away, and in the meantime he'd have a quasi-ally who'd be able to tell him how nervous he should be about mobile columns of empty air that stayed away from the circle around the altar.  For that matter, Alex didn't like the way the air outside the circle was noticeably more clear than the air inside it.

Instead of having Mulder almost certainly headed his way, Alex was somewhere in the English countryside, naked, weaponless, bound to an altar, with his only possible help an unknown quantity calling herself Amanda.  She had courage, no question there, but his instincts told him she'd been dodging certain lines of questioning as carefully as he had.  Not good when he needed someone solidly on his side if he was going to survive.

The lead figure appeared in Alex's peripheral vision and trapped his jaw with a surprisingly soft hand.  The other hand roamed his body appreciatively and far too intimately as Heath Butler leaned in to lick blood and sweat off Alex's lips.  His eyes were very blue, his skin exquisitely fair, and his smile looked forward to activities that Alex wanted nothing to do with.

"Very nice," he said, almost purring.  "It is a pity about the arm, but the rest of you... oh, yes, this will be a pleasure.  I'll have to make it last."

Alex watched him, gaze going cold as he considered how to drag out Butler's death when he got the chance, and fuck the Consortium's plans for him.  He stayed silent, though, waiting, evaluating, watching for levers he could use.  Fighting would be later.  When he could win.

Butler's hands were too skilled and there was no point in resisting when he could use the pleasure to fend off the pain, for a while at least.  Alex felt his cock fill, felt the heat start to burn up his nerves, and let his body's reactions show in his eyes rather than his mind's revulsion.  Butler smiled and licked a delicate path up his cheekbone, waiting to see when Alex would close his eyes... then bit at a new bruise along the temple when he didn't.  "Ah, cat eyes but has the cat got your tongue?  And here I have plans for it."

Amanda sounded amazingly bored for a woman waiting to be killed.  "Do you always try to be clever?  With so much evidence against it?"

Alex fought to keep his reactions out of his face and eyes; something in her voice had changed.  Not bravado.  It sounded more like... purpose.  Not saving him, despite the timing of the distraction.  It couldn't be done as things stood.  What had changed? How?

"Start on her," Butler said and bent to sink his teeth into Alex's neck.  Teeth on sensitive nerves could have been enjoyable, but Butler never let up on the pressure.  No suction, no tongue this time, only teeth and slowly tightening jaw muscles.  He drew blood just as Alex heard a sharp crack of leather on flesh behind him.  He wanted to get away, but between the straps and hands on him there was nothing he could do except enjoy as much of it as he could and try to draw Butler's attention off Amanda to give her time to work.  He let his eyes close partway and moaned softly, pretending he enjoyed the pain.

"Pretty liar," Butler breathed and traced a line of blood up Alex's chest that only hurt a long instant after Butler's shoulder quit moving.

The blade was very sharp, then.  Great.  He couldn't be an amateur with knives too?  Behind Alex, the scourge came down again and again as Butler continued to alternate pain and pleasure with teeth and hands, tongue and blade... until Amanda's voice cut across the pain drumming along Alex's nerves.

"Sanguinem sudoremque accipiunto ut istud artum perfringant."

The next crack wasn't leather; it sounded like a wood splitting, or thick glass hitting concrete.  Butler heard it and spun away from Alex, robes swirling around him as he brought his hands up to block off whatever was happening.

The incense in the air around the altar poured over the edges of the circle and down through the floor like water.  Cold air surged in, spinning past Alex and drawing goose bumps along his flesh.  Now he could almost see people where the empty spaces had been:  a tall, fair man in his forties; an equally tall, black woman with dreadlocks past her shoulders and a silver tooth showing in a snarl; a black-haired boy, barely old enough to shave... more and more of them.  They were spinning past Alex, deliberately avoiding him to claw at Butler with hands pale except where bright drops or lines of Amanda's blood lent them strength or reality.

The voices were a soft, almost nonexistent hissing like old tape through headphones sitting on a table, but they were murderously angry and discussing details Alex didn't want to understand.  You want the treasures of the cove? ... left me underneath the vine ... buried her beneath the open stars ... hidden and shaded by the leaves ... a waste ... I still hold you close to me!

An angry old man almost forced his words to normal volume, but in his rage he clawed Butler too hard; he stumbled into Alex.  The ghost tucked his hands against his chest as he realized what was happening, but he still fell into Alex and through him, leaving Alex frozen inside and scorched at the edges.  He retched helplessly, unable to stop the churning of pain and shock, unable to double over because of the straps, and with nothing in his stomach to bring up except bile.  The ghost held his blood-daubed hands out in an imploring, apologetic gesture.  Alex realized, later, that he had Butler's eyes, but the anger in them was hot, not cold, despite the distance of death.

The wordless apology was no consolation for racking nausea on top of a concussion and cracked ribs.  Alex lost part of the next few minutes to the demands of breathing and keeping his heart beating despite a headache that almost made him wish his heart would stop doing noisy things like pumping blood for just a minute or two....  When he could see again, the shades were melting into the ground and Butler wasn't in his line of sight anymore.  "Amanda?"

"Oh, good!"  She sounded very relieved.  "You are alive.  What's your name, anyway?  I didn't think calling 'Hey, you' was a good idea there...."

He barely hesitated.  "Alex.  Where did they go?"

"The ghosts?  Or Butler and his idiots?"

"Butler.  The ghosts weren't trying to kill me."

"Well, no, or you'd be dead," she agreed, too calmly.  "Butler's on the ground somewhere near you.  I heard him fall.  These two idiots are over here, also dead."  She paused and then he heard her exhale in a gusting sigh that told Alex volumes about how worried she'd really been.  "And the cavalry is finally here.  Late, but still."

The French doors shattered inward with her last words, an explosion of glass shards, water, and wind-torn leaves.  The temperature in the room dropped even farther as rain and hail sprayed across the polished wood floor.  A tall man in black leather and denim strode through the glass, left hand casually swinging a mace to clear the remaining glass away from his shoulders.  The gun in his right hand was reassuringly steady.

A slim woman followed him through the gaping doorframes -- also wearing black leather, a longsword in her right hand and a matte-black pistol in her left.  Under the red light, her hair was rain-darkened to a sandy copper.  She ignored the glass crunching under her boots as she matter-of-factly swung the sword near Alex's leg; the blade never touched him.  "Amanda?"

The crisp tone seemed to leave Amanda relieved rather than chastised.  "Cut their throats to be certain, Rebecca.  They left at least twenty vengeful spirits here.  Amateur black sorcerers who didn't realize that last rites are called rites for a reason.... Cory, darling, what took you so long?"

"Doll-face, I don't carry guns, you know that, and you're the security expert."  A knife flashed along the edges of Alex's vision and strong hands caught him as he staggered for that first dizzying second.  "So I had to call for help.  Got him, Rebecca?"

"Yes, but who are you?" Rebecca asked Alex, studying him as if he was a puzzle she hadn't expected to run into.  "You need a doctor."

Alex shook his head.  "I need a shower, my clothes and gun, and a two-minute lead before you torch this place."  He stepped away from the altar, fighting for balance and breath, determined not to trip over any corpses.  He added grimly, "And if you aren't burning it, I am."  He was turning, carefully, to see if he could get a blade or gun when he got a good look at Cory.  "Yob'...."

Cory stared at him, too.  Uninjured, somehow both younger and older, but they had each other's features.  It wasn't the resemblance of father to son, or close cousins; if they were thinking about the same subject, they would pass for twins.  Alex swallowed against the nausea surging up in him and reached back to brace himself on the frame he'd been praying to escape.

Cory reached out and caught him before he could sag.  "I've got extra clothes and clearly they'll fit you...."  He shook his head, clearly as startled by the resemblance as Alex felt.  "Christ.  Matthew said I had a twin, but he never--"

"Matthew?  Matthew McCormick?  Rescued by the FBI after all."  And then Alex was laughing, helpless against it, and wondering in the back of his mind what drugs were still in his system and what a ghost's transit had done to a body that had hosted Oil, because he couldn't stop laughing.  Not for shortness of breath, or a headache stabbing through his temple and putting prisms around the lights in the room.

A warm bare arm wrapped around his waist and Amanda used Russian and her most imperious Party apparatchik accent to order, "Breathe, Alexei.  Now."  Her hands were covered in blood, but Alex didn't care.  She was warm, and it was human blood, and he followed her orders; it helped lessen the sway of the room around him.

Amanda was talking over his head, something about, "...drugged, Rebecca, probably concussed, and cracked ribs, and he never quit trying to help -- oh, thank you, Cory.  We'd better let Alex see Butler before we leave; he was starting in on Alex's rape when the ghosts got him."

Alex looked long enough to see Butler's remains on the floor -- robes flung open and bloodied where someone had very efficiently gutted and castrated him -- and he managed to nod without throwing up.  They lowered him to the floor, the too-cold floor, and Alex let his concentration ebb for a moment.  Just for a second, he promised himself. Just gathering energy....

Something cool and smelling faintly of alcohol brushed his temple and Alex's eyes snapped open.  Rebecca knelt beside him, a pack by her leg and medical supplies scattered around.  "Back with us?"  She made the words gentle, reassuring.  "I need to wrap your ribs, and you need a night's rest with someone looking after you.  Your pupils are blown."

Alex knew he didn't like that, but it took a moment to translate to 'concussed.'  "I'll manage."

Rebecca nodded slowly.  "I was afraid you'd take it that way.  Cory will only show up on your doorstep if you leave alone, you know.  He's worried and intrigued.  It's a dangerous combination from him."

Alex caught his breath at the surety in her eyes.  "Countess or baroness?"

Rebecca just chuckled.  "Flatterer.  Here."  She tugged him upright carefully; it barely hurt his ribs.  "Let's get these wrapped before Cory shows back up with clothes for you.  Thank you for trying to help Amanda."

"It was mutual."  Alex resisted the impulse to shrug.

"Mmm."  He wondered, briefly, which of them had given the other the habit of that contemplative non-answer.  "Actually, most of this is probably her fault.  Cory hasn't said what they were doing here, but I'm not under any illusions that it was legal.  Do you have anyone to look after you?"

"Why do you really care?"

Rebecca studied him from those dark, knowing eyes in that pale, pale face and then smiled suddenly.  "Well, among other things, if Matthew wants you alive and I let you go off with a concussion, he'll be furious.  I'd really rather avoid seeing his temper again, much less directed at me."  Rebecca's voice was unexpectedly somber as she added, "And I've feared most of her life that I'd see Amanda die before me.  I'm grateful that you helped prevent it."

"She did... whatever she did."  Alex did shrug.

"While you kept Butler off her, she says, and at some cost to yourself," Rebecca said quietly.  "I cleaned out the bite marks, but you should get a tetanus shot if you haven't had one lately.  Human bites go septic far too easily, and his tastes were particularly foul."

Cory came in, moving quickly and lightly despite the bags over his shoulder; he had Alex's prosthesis in one hand.  "Found it, finally.  We're almost done, Rebecca, how is he -- good, you're awake, Alex."  He settled next to Alex, already pulling clothes out of a bag.  "Sorry, no extra socks or underwear, but jeans, jumper, and combat boots... yeah, looks like our feet are the same size."  He paused, then touched a gentle finger to a birthmark on Alex's thigh.  "Man.  You'd think we really were twins."

Alex barely shook his head.  "Mama might not have told me, but Dasha never kept secrets from me worth a damn."

"Oh, we're not twins," Cory agreed.  "You and I really do need to talk when your head's not killing you."  Green eyes gleamed and Alex had a moment to wonder if he really looked like this when he was planning something.  "How would you feel about trading out unbreakable alibis...?"

Alex laughed and found himself braced against Rebecca's shoulder to be sure he didn't fall.  She smelled of leather, sweat, cordite, blood, and a strong, sweet scent of female under it all, he noticed, and only then realized how badly the drugs were screwing him up.  His thoughts wouldn't stay in one place.  "Fuck.  You said you owe me," he told Rebecca.

"I did?" she asked, amused.

Cory winced as Alex forced out, "You said this was Amanda's fault.  Someone owes me.  I need a place to hole up for the night until the crap's out of my blood."

Rebecca chuckled.  "That's fair enough."

Cory said cheerfully, "Sunrise won't be long, actually.  We'll ring it in with a spot of arson, Alex."

"And you can come stay with me for a day or two," Rebecca said, smiling.  "John's used to my bringing strangers home.  After a call from Cory, he'll find you almost reassuringly normal, Alex."

A beautiful woman with short, dark, blood-splattered hair knelt next to Cory in a rustle of worn-soft black leather that fit too well to be anything but hers.  She had a broadsword on her belt, Alex saw, and knives in her boots; even with blood and what looked like machine oil across her cheek, she was exquisite.  So that was what Amanda looked like.  He'd been wondering.  All of them were beautiful, in a sharp and terrible way, all wearing leather and steel as casually as Alex would and looking like angels stepped down from church windows to handle a few battles before the end of days....  And that thought is proof that I'd better find a bolt hole until this crap is out of my system.

"All right.  I'll come with you."

Rebecca's light touch never disturbed Alex as she helped with his prosthetic, with standing up, even with walking a straight line.  Amanda ranged ahead of them, prowling like a cat sniffing out every scrap of catnip -- and every mouse hole.  Cory reappeared behind them, announced only by the scent of smoke and petrol that rolled downwind over Alex's shoulders.  He stayed out of Alex's sight, however, as if he knew that seeing an unexpected twin was just too much for Alex on top of the throbbing headache and the drugs.

Outside, the storm had blown through and left a fragile peace in its wake.  Drops of water glinted on the leaves and branches, on the wrought iron gate, and fog seeped slowly up under the pale light tinting the east.  Behind and under those lay the smell of burning leaves and wood, a prosaic scent that would soon enough rise to an uncontrolled burn instead of a controlled morning fire.

Alex never wanted to see the house or property again.  He was pretty sure they'd granted that wish -- angels or no.

~ ~ ~ finis ~ ~ ~

Comments, Commentary, and Miscellanea:

Written for the X-Files 'Spooky' Lyric Wheel; lyrics provided by Tarlan and listed below.  Lyrics used, in part, whole, or adaptation to other tenses marked with *.  My kind husband helped me peel out themes to use and didn't complain when I lived on coffee to write this one.  And yes, so far as I can tell, there was a brief period where Alex Krycek could have met Rebecca Horne.  Mostly, though, I thought, 'Who'd help Amanda on no notice?' and then I realized I was getting a once in a lifetime opportunity to write Cory and Rebecca in black leather with medieval weapons.  I took it.

"Sanguinem sudoremque accipiunto ut istud artum perfringant. " -- Latin.  "Let them receive this blood and sweat that they may break through that boundary [literally, that boundedness]."  Latin kindly corrected from my original, incorrect version by Vanzetti; a thousand thanks, kind lady.  The problem with magic is that the victim might know some too, and if leaving blood on Amanda's face and hair leaves her salt, blood, and water to break a circle....

Yob'. -- Russian.  "Fuck."

No matter what I do, whether they'll tell me the back-story or not, my Kryceks always seem to know Matthew McCormick (an FBI agent from Highlander:  the Series).  Knowing both characters as I do, I can't say that's reassuring.

"The Devil's Own," by David Sylvian

Gorgeous graphics courtesy of