Night Fell Softly
by R'rain

His sleep was restless and fraught with disturbing dreams
that he didn't quite remember when he woke.  Slowly he
opened his eyes and flung the covers off his sweat-soaked
body, laying flat on his back.  As the breeze from an open
window swept across his naked body it began to shiver in
sudden uncontrolled bursts.  He just lay there, helpless to
stop it.

Images still swirled in his head like mad hallucinations.
Was he ill?  Why was he so warm and so cold at the same
time?  His hand reached out and pulled the covers back over
him; he didn't remember telling it to.  It felt as if his
every move, his every breath, was not his own.  What were
these images?  Who was the shadowy figure that he somehow
knew had been there, beckoning him just out of his reach?

Mulder shook his head and closed his eyes, trying to come
back to himself and shake the feeling that he was still
dreaming.  When he reopened his eyes, his room began to have
sharp edges again and the hazy dreamlike quality faded.
Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, he got up and
shut the widow.  The curtains flapped in an imaginary breeze
for a few moments afterwards as he stared out into the empty
street below.  He couldn't tell what time it was--sometime
before dawn was all he knew.  The clock next to his bed
flashed twelve o'clock, as if mocking him for not bothering
to reset it after the last power outage.

The only sounds he could hear were the hum of his
refrigerator and the wax and wane of distant traffic.  He
could have sworn, when he woke, that somehow he had not been
alone.  That the shadowy figure from his dream had been
here, in his apartment, in his room.  He shivered again,
even though the window was closed, and wrapped his arms
around himself walking back to the bed.

He tried to forget.  There were times when he tried to
forget everything, almost as often as he tried to remember
it all.  Russia was in his too recent past, and what he went
through there was not going to leave him so soon.  His past
had come back to haunt him yet again, as it had done so
often in the last few years.

What was it all worth, in the end?  What did he really hope
to get after all he had gone through, after all he had put
everyone close to him through.  Samantha?  He already knew
that the sister he would get back would not be the same one
he lost.  She would have changed so much.  And even if not a
day had gone by for her, he would have changed too much to
ever be her brother Fox again.  The truth?  That was what
drove him all right, but sometimes the truth wasn't what he
wanted it to be.

Like Russia.  The incident was incredible and terrifying,
but the truth was that no one would ever know it had
happened.  There was nothing he could do to change that.  It
was hard to keep his passion for his work when he had lost
so many people in so short a time.  The one time he'd
thought he'd found a kindred spirit in his work, he turned
out to be a traitor and a murderer.

There was still no hint of light in the night sky, but his
eyes were accustomed to the dimness of his bedroom.  He
realized that he had been standing at the edge of his bed,
staring into nowhere for a long time.  He still felt like he
was teetering on the edge of dreamstate and reality, like he
had never fully awakened.

"I had a dream tonight."  The voice came from the bedroom
door, the door that moments ago had been closed.  Mulder
didn't turn to face it.  The voice came from outside the
reality he was standing in; it came from the dream side.

"I had a dream too," he confessed.  "I dreamed about you."

"I know."  His arms were around Mulder's chilled body,
warming it, and with a gentle nudge they were on top of the
unkempt covers.  "You dreamed that we were back in Russia
again, that we were back in the dark, dank cell together.
You dreamed that I never killed anyone, that I never
betrayed you.  You dreamed that we made love on that stone
floor until the guards came back to take us away.  Didn't
you."

"You know I did."  He didn't wait for more words to come
from Krycek's mouth, didn't think about what he was doing.
He latched his lips onto Krycek's and didn't release them
until his lungs screamed for oxygen.  If this was a dream,
he didn't want it to end until he'd done everything he'd
always wanted to.

Krycek pushed him just far enough away that their lips were
no longer touching.  "I knew you wanted this," he said.  "I
always knew."

"Shhhh," said Mulder, "don't talk.  Don't talk."  His tongue
ran along the edge of Krycek's jaw, tasting the thin sheen
of sweat that matched his own.  There was the barest hint of
stubble that pricked his tongue and scratched his skin as he
made his way to the soft earlobe.  He enveloped it with his
lips and tasted it as well, his hands encountering the bare
skin of Krycek's back.  His back was firm and muscular, the
skin slick in places.  With a fingertip, he chased a bead of
sweat from between Krycek's shoulderblades down to his
waistband.

His skin was luscious, and Mulder wished he could taste it
all.  His lips meandered beneath Krycek's jaw, taking little
nips here and there until he reached the first nipple, still
soft and circled with a ring of tiny, crinkly hairs.  He
latched onto it and sucked, flicking his tongue across it
rapidly and digging his fingers into Krycek's back.  He
could feel his own arousal growing from the faint twinges he
had felt when he woke to raging need.

Impatience won him over as he traced a line with his tongue
down Krycek's abdomen.  With a gentle pressure he rolled
them over so that Krycek's back was flat against the
mattress and Mulder's hands were gripping his shoulders.
This body he had wanted to possess for months, years, was
finally his, but might vanish at any moment.  With a flick
of his head, he undid Krycek's jeans with his teeth and
nuzzled the hardness beneath him.  He didn't want to let go
of his lover, but he was forced to as he pulled the jeans
down a few inches and released his beautiful cock.

Krycek was silent as he licked it from base to tip, tasting
the drop of precum that had already formed.  It was all he
had imagined on those long, lonely nights.  Better.  Closing
his lips around the head, he slid down until it hit the back
of his throat, then paused a moment before opening his
throat and letting the rest of it slide down.  He felt a
crazy urge to weep for joy as he began moving up and down
along it's length, feeling it grow harder and begin to
throb.  To think that he was really doing this was
overwhelming.  His hands held Krycek's hips, and Krycek's
hands slid down his own body to cover them.  Krycek squeezed
Mulder's hands hard as he began to come, arching his back
and tightening every muscle in his body, but remaining
silent.   All at once he fell back onto the bed and Mulder's
lips slipped from his fading erection.  Wrapping his arms
around Krycek's waist, Mulder lay his head on Krycek's
thigh, his nose just brushing against his groin.  He closed
his eyes.

Mulder woke to the light from his window streaming into his
empty room.