Title:  Angels and Shadows
Author:  The Rat's Mouse (the_rats_mouse@yahoo.com)
Rating:  PG-13 for violence and one crude thought
Spoilers:  4th Season 
Keywords:  Scully/Krycek
Archive:  Anywhere as long as my name is attatched and you 
send me the address.
Author's Notes:  This is my first posted fanfiction.  I've 
written a few others but they were never good enough to 
post.  If you like this one please tell me!!
------------------- 

Until now, I don't think I've ever really thought about the 
fragileness of life.  About how delicate the balance is 
between taking your next breath or breathing your last.  I 
mean, you don't really have time to contemplate it's 
meaning while you're too busy worrying if you're not gonna 
be the next one lying lifeless on the floor.  But right 
now, I'm holding in my hand the death warrant of an 
innocent.  The x-rays of  a woman's skull.

I take one drably colored plastic sheet out of it's folder 
and place it on the screening wall in front of me.  With my 
pointer finger, I trace the outline of what looks like a 
white smudge on the x-ray just above and to the right of 
where the sinus cavity is located.  I pull out another, 
more recently dated, and hang it beside the first, 
comparing and contrasting between the two.  The same white 
mass on the first has grown nearly an inch in diameter on 
the second.

I know the implications  I've seen it dozens of times 
before.  Cancer is slowly infecting the brain, spreading 
it's poisonous carcinogens into this soul's system at an 
alarmingly fast rate.  Sure, sometimes it's not brain 
cancer, it's colon or liver or skin, but it all has the 
same origins.  I can't believe this is happening.  She's 
not supposed to be the one to die.  I know because I know 
their game.  She's much too valuable an asset to discard so 
soon.  I knew it would happen, but why are they allowing it 
to go on this long?  Good god, she only has a few more 
months before she's out of the game permanently.

My brow furrows as I return the x-rays to their folder and 
tuck them safely into my jacket.  I think I'll be borrowing 
these for a while.  Silently I slip out of the room and 
into the hospital stairwell.  All of my life, I've killed 
to save myself and ensure my own future.  Now, I'll kill to 
save someone else's.  Two hours later, three bodies lay 
sprawled at my feet, expressions of terror still frozen on 
their palled faces.  Pools of blood rapidly form and spread 
under the cooling bodies, soaking and staining the white 
labcoats they wear.  Don't worry, they died with relatively 
little pain.  Despite what most people assume of me, I 
don't enjoy killing.  It's just something that has to be 
done, like taking out the garbage.

My gun returnes to the waistband of my jeans and I turn to 
leave.  Disappointingly, none of them had what I needed or 
the information to obtain it with.  They weren't the ones I 
was hoping to find and so I leave them.  You might call it 
a present to my Morley smoking friend.

I return to my car and pull it away from the curb, not sure 
exactly where I'm heading and not really caring either.  I 
need some time to myself, to be alone with my thoughts and 
to plan my next move.  I can't go to my apartment.  Once 
the word is out that I'm back in town that'll be the first 
place they search, and it's probably had so many bugs 
placed in it since my absence that they could monitor my 
heartbeat.  I think I'll have to play one of my wild cards 
for now.

But first, I need to see her.  I don't really know why, at 
this point it's almost suicide to do so, but I just need 
to.  Exactly when I decided to become Scully's shadow, I 
have no idea.  She'd just as soon castrate me and serve my 
balls with scherri than let me help her with anything.  And 
why not?  I know she has more reason to hate me than even 
Mulder does, I've hurt her badly in the past two years.  
But I don't want to do that anymore.  I want to help her, 
and maybe it'll clear some of my conscience on the side.  
It's with these thoughts that I drive my car to her 
apartment and park across the street.  I look up at her 
third story window and see that all's dark inside.  For a 
moment I wonder if she's home and try to talk myself out of 
this.  But my will is stronger than my reason tonight and 
so I make my way across the street and into her apartment 
building.  Getting past security and picking her lock is no 
problem, and I'm inside in a matter of moments.  Quietly I 
close and re-lock the door and listen for any sounds of 
life.  Nothing.

The electrical outlets and lamp shades are off first, and I 
locate the two bugs in the living room (I have many many 
contacts you see) and disable them.   With that done, I now 
move with measured step into the bedroom.  A thin line of 
moonlight streams through the slit in the curtains, falling 
in a circle onto the soft blue quilt that adorns the bed.  
As I walk the perimeter of the room and draw nearer to the 
far wall, I can see that the sheets have been pulled back a 
little and that they mold around the sleeping body that's 
there.

I'm careful not to tread into the light.  I don't know why, 
maybe it would spoil the effect of me stealing these 
moments for myself.  But I do move so that I can see her 
head lying on her pillow, strands of red hair splayed in a 
fan across the soft blue cotton.  Her face is turned away 
from me, but I don't really care.  All I want is to see her 
sleeping here and keep the knowledge with me that she's 
safe.

Strangely though, I'm greatly disappointed with the scene I 
see before me.  I don't know what I was expecting, but I 
feel like this is far from it.  Suddenly, the answer hits 
me: Mulder.  Her guardian and protector, Mulder, is no 
where to be seen while these precocious moments are ticking 
by.  He should be here to hold her, comfort her, and dry 
her tears.  By god, the woman's dying, his partner is 
dying...  the only person he cares a rat's ass about.  He's 
told her before that she's all he has left, and yet where 
is he?  Probably sitting at home in his dark little 
apartment whacking himself off while one of his "videos" 
plays on.  My blood boils at the very thought.

A slight stirring of the bedsheets startles me and the 
thought of being caught makes me panic.  Scully tosses onto 
her other side, her face now turned towards me and I tense 
up, suddenly fozen in place.  But, she turns and goes still 
again and I realize she was only turning in her sleep.  I 
let out the breath that I wasn't even aware I was holding 
and it sounds harsh in the relative silence of the room.  
My eyes fall onto Scully's sleeping face and I'm shocked to 
see how pale it looks.  Her normal paleness usually has a 
peachy undertone to it, a kind of golden cast.  But still 
she looks beautiful.

Slowly I feel myself being drawn closer towards her.  I 
know I've already stayed longer than needed, but I just 
can't seem to tear myself away from here.  Ever so slowly I 
close the distance between me and her bedside.  The 
survivalist side of my brain tells me to get the hell out 
of there before I do something really stupid, but my 
survivalist is studiously ignored into oblivion without 
much protest.  Now that I'm this close I can make out the 
small faded stains that dot the pillow under her head, 
caused by midnight nosebleeds.  They make me wish I had 
left Russia sooner, so that I could have been here whenever 
they came to wipe away the blood and tell her that it's 
going to be okay.

My right hand(the good one) seemingly lifts on it's own 
accord and very lightly touches one of these stains, then 
slowly travels down, smooths out a wrinkle in the fabric, 
and hovers just above Scully's vibrant auburn hair.  Even 
in darkness it seems to have a natural shine to it.  I want 
to touch it, to feel it's strands slip through my fingers.  
So soft...  Scully's hair has always been an obsession for 
me.  It's beautiful, thick and healthy looking, with just a 
hint of curl kept sternly in check with one or two styling 
products.  I bet if she would just let it dry naturally 
it'd have a thousand curls in it.

With some hesitation, I withdraw my hand to my side.  I 
don't want to get too carried away here.  So after one more 
moment of watching the sleeping form in front of me, I 
leave quietly, but before I walk from the room, I turn and 
whisper, "Da svedanya, my Angel."  With that, I leave, 
returning into the night to prepare for my next strike.