Part Ten

Instead of answering, Alex's only response was to rise to his feet and take a step away from the bed; shrugging his shoulder roughly to dislodge Mulder's tentative touch. Mulder felt his stomach clench in fear. Although he had half expected Alex to turn around and tell him to go fuck himself, the actual reality of Alex's seeming rejection made him feel like he'd been gut-shot.

"Alex," he pleaded, scrambling off the bed, throwing his arms around Alex's rigid back and clutching him with a bruising desperation. "Don't…don't you fucking *dare* leave me now!"

As declarations of love went, it fell well short of any romantic ideal. Yet there never *had* been anything soft between them. There always had been an undercurrent of violence beneath the lust, or perhaps just lust beneath the violence. Either way it was somehow enough, because Alex twisted in his arms and despite the pale tearstained face there was nothing soft or loving in his intense green eyes.

Just a raw and primitive hunger.

"Fuck me," Mulder growled, his own eyes darkening in the face of Alex's anger, and his cock snapped back against his stomach, already drooling its own anticipation of Alex's lust.

Alex's mouth twisted into an almost feral snarl and he took a step forward, pressing himself against the length of Mulder's body, his left hand clutching at one of Mulder's bare shoulders and his right fist closing in Mulder's hair and yanking cruelly. Eyes watering, Mulder choked back a yelp of pain and tipped his head backward to ease the pressure until the skin of his throat was taut around his Adam's apple and his breath was escaping through his pain-clenched teeth in short panting gasps.

Alex drooped his head and latched his mouth onto the vulnerable flesh, his teeth worrying and nipping, his breath on Mulder's skin as hot and merciless as a desert wind.

"Oh god," Mulder moaned, as Alex's chest pushed against his own with the slow force of a glacier and the fingers in his hair tightened with root-ripping relentlessness until his spine was arched so unnaturally that his only option was topple backward onto the bed.

He fell, sprawling on the mattress, his limbs splayed in sacrifice, and Alex flowed down with him, adhered by teeth and sweat and the pounding duet of their conjoined hearts.

Slide of skin against skin, sweat-slicked hardness that bowed and danced and flirted in eager rut in the dark furnace that burned between their taut abdomens. Writhing in synchrony, like a two-headed beast, their bodies rolled and twisted on the mattress as steel clashed against steel, parry and thrust, entwining like blind cobras in a hissing yet sensuous dance.

Teeth gnawed a red, vibrant chasm down Mulder's throat. Bright pain exploding across his chest, fire ravaging a nipple until his back arched and his hips bucked and he twisted and wailed, panicked and desperate until the fiery heat faded and then surged again in his other nipple. Slick fingered hand slipping between his trembling legs, gliding over the taut skin of his balls, sliding snakelike down his perineum, taunting finger stabbing at his anus, sharp-needled pain tugging and teasing his teeth-swollen tits.

And this time, as he screamed and thrashed, his knees winged open so that his bucking, squirming desperation found the focus of his fear and identified its source.

Not that Alex's assault would continue, but that it might stop.

~#~#~#~

"Forgive me. I don't wish to intrude but you seem troubled," a smoky velvet voice husked.

Scully stiffened with both irritation and a vague feeling of disquiet that she had apparently been too lost in her miserable thoughts to even realize that someone had taken the seat next to her. The seat that *should* be empty. She stared at the pale ghost of her face reflected in the small round window, rubbed her eyes furtively, then snapped her head around to glare at the unwelcome intruder, her mouth already set in a thin line of displeasure.

Then her red-rimmed eyes widened slightly and she felt the taut tension in her spine begin to crumble, the last vestiges of the strength that had carried her from the morgue and onto this plane with at least a semblance of normality now seeping out of her so that she felt small and weak and oh so desperately in need of comfort.

Her whole body arched towards the stranger, a pavlovian response to his presence, an almost childlike longing to simply cling to the safety promised by this man in black.

Yet, even as she felt herself weakening, as her body slumped towards his outstretched hand like a heat-wilted plant drooping thankfully into an offer of cool shade, her mind snapped back into gear and she pulled back stiffening with embarrassment and anger.

"I don't want your help," she choked. "I don't want to hear your platitudes and lies. I don't want to hear you tell me that this was God's plan, because I…I don't believe."

"Such terrible pain," the priest murmured sympathetically, reaching forward and lightly touching the small cross that hung above her breasts. An intimate gesture, one that should have offended her but instead inspired her to tentatively reach up and stroke the white dog-collar that separated his dark tunic from the almost equally dark skin of his neck. Their eyes met, stark blue pain and warm chocolate comfort, she sniffed loudly and then collapsed against him.

"I…I've lost my faith again," she admitted, a gasping wail of grief.

"That's the nature of faith," he replied kindly. "It's never *easy* to believe that the things that come to pass are truly part of a greater plan."

"He's dead," she sniffed. "I loved him and now he's dead. What's the point in that? Where does *that* fit into any plan?"

"Just because you can't see the whole picture, doesn't mean it isn't there," he reminded her. "We just see snatches and glimpses, Every soul is a part of the tapestry, and though we may consider that the thread of a life has been snipped too soon there must be *reason* and necessity for that thread being short."

"Well, usually," he added, under his breath.

She glared bitterly at him, hating the calmness of his words as they emerged from the almost offensive beauty of his face. How old was he anyway? she wondered. He was early twenties at most, his features still unmarked by age and grief, his body still strong with youth. He didn't know how it felt to be ravaged by disease. He'd never found a child then lost her, lost the ability to even *have* a child, and then miraculously give birth to one only to yet again have that child taken from her arms.

He'd never had a sister murdered, or a partner die and rise from the grave, or a man he loved die alone and unmourned in a lonely basement.

For a moment she blazed with fury. She wanted to strike him with words, wanted to see him cower beneath the horrors that she had suffered. She knew more of the 'tapestry' than this innocent, offensively good-looking priest did. She'd peeled back the layers of it and had found a cesspit of depravity and suffering and sin. If he knew what *she* knew, he wouldn't be sitting there so secure in his 'faith'.

"I could tell you things…" she began. Things that would shatter him. Things that would shatter the very foundations of his faith and leave him floundering like she was.

If he believed her, she reminded herself suddenly, and so she laughed, the sound bitter and sad and lost. Why would he believe her when she barely believed it herself?

"What things?" he asked.

Her hand fluttered down to his and she patted it softly.

"Nothing," she sighed. "You're right, Father. The nature of faith is to believe the impossible and though I want to believe, it's *my* nature to doubt everything."

"It's only the church that demands blind faith, not God," he replied quietly. "Doubting isn't a sin. Sin is when you *know* the truth but still turn your back on it. Your immortal soul is safe."

"You sound terribly sure of that," Scully retorted, amused despite herself at the solemn certainty of the young priest's words. "You don't even know me, Father…?"

"Mordad," he replied, "And I know you well enough, Dana Scully."

"How do you know my name?" Scully demanded, flinching back in her seat suspiciously.

Mordad smiled at her sadly.

"I know *all* of you," he whispered and pointed to the stewardess who was working the drinks trolley towards them. "Her name's Sue Thompson. She's twenty-seven. Two abortions already and she's just skipped a period and is too scared to even take a test. She just can't bear to go through it again, but the father's married already and she's terrified he'll think she did it deliberately."

Mordad pointed across the aisle. "That's Gordon Fairfax. He was a stockbroker until yesterday. Fired for embezzlement. Gambling problem. The bank's about to foreclose on his house. Two divorces, four kids and he's already six months behind on his alimony payments. He's flying back to his old hometown to take a fatal overdose. Not much loss to the world, admittedly, but he's got a donor card and it just so happens that there's a nice kid, Eugenia Tamen, waiting for a new heart in the very hospital he's *supposed* to die in."

"Who are you?" Scully demanded, cringing back in her seat. "How do you know these things?"

"That's Jose Rodriguez. See the way he keeps shuffling in his seat and wiping the sweat off his brow? He looks like he's about to pull a bomb out of his bag, doesn't he? Truth is, his wife's just gone into premature labor with their first child and he's scared stiff he won't arrive in time to be with her."

"I don't know whether you're trying to impress me or scare me," Scully snapped, "but it's not working."

Mordad just gave her a sad smile.

" Neither. Just thinking out loud, really," he admitted. "Do you ever have days when you decide that your job sucks?"

"Frequently," Scully admitted.

"Me too," Mordad sighed.

~#~#~#~

"Just do it," Mulder pleaded, thrashing his head deliriously as Alex's finger slipped in and out of his ass teasingly. "For god's sake, Alex, what the hell are you waiting for?"

Alex just snickered and continued to simply taunt Mulder with a finger while he proceeded with his tongue's slow, luxurious grazing on Mulder's balls.

"Oh, please," Mulder groaned, pulling desperately against the silken restraints that were pinning his wrists to the headboard to prevent him from hurrying Alex along. They were so loose he could easily free himself but that, in a way, made them feel even tighter. Releasing himself would be losing somehow, and Mulder had no intention of losing this battle between them.

Still, his neglected cock was lying red and engorged along his abdomen, twitching angrily with every suck and nibble of Alex's mouth on his balls. "Stop fucking teasing me and FUCK me," he demanded.

Alex reared up between Mulder's sprawled thighs, his lips swollen and wet with saliva and the salty sweat of Mulder's overheated groin, and he grinned evilly as he reached down and stroked his own cock until it lengthened and swelled.

"Oh shit," Mulder whimpered hungrily. "It gets bigger…"

"Oh yeah," Alex agreed. "Sure you're ready for this, Foxy?"

"Don't call me…"

"Lose the attitude, babe. *I'm* the one with the loaded weapon," Alex chuckled.

"Just…do…it…" Mulder growled, scissoring his legs behind Alex's back and attempting to drag him forward into place.

"Jeez, Mulder," Alex laughed. "I'm topping *you* this time, remember? This is my party."

But he let Mulder's legs pull him forward until his cock was pressed against the now welcoming entrance to Mulder's heat, and as his cockhead touched the slick, puckered skin his intention to prolong the game dissolved beneath the sudden, irresistible call of Mulder's desire and he plunged inside.

Mulder screamed, a wail of combined pain and triumph, as Alex's unnaturally huge cock ploughed into him, stretching him wider than his sphincter believed it could open, filling him deeper than his body had room to accommodate an invader.

"HURTS," he howled.

Alex froze in horror and began to withdraw, only for Mulder to clamp down with unbelievable strength and pin him in place.

"Did…I…tell…you…to…stop?" Mulder growled, through clenched teeth.

Alex blinked uncertainly as he stared down through sweat-drenched lashes at the weirdly triumphant smirk on Mulder's face.

"I don't want to hurt you…" he choked.

Mulder twisted his wrists out of the restraints, grabbed Alex by the back of the neck and pulled him down for a vicious kiss. He forced his tongue into Alex's mouth in a brutal echo of the thrust of the cock into his body, then bit down on Alex's lower lip until he squealed in pain.

Then, as Alex reared back, licking his torn lip, eyes wide with shock, Mulder smiled with satisfaction.

"See? This is *my* party, Alex," he purred. "Now stop fucking about and FUCK me."

~#~#~#~

Walter closed his eyes and took a deep steadying breath.

It was a mistake. As soon as his eyelids shuttered, the sunbed lurched like a wild bronco beneath his ass and a wave of resultant nausea surged upward from his stomach and filled his throat with a vile burn. He snapped his eyes open, and swayed unsteadily until the patio stopped tilting precariously around him.

"M'drunk," he finally admitted, staring at his empty glass with confused disbelief.

It wasn't so much the fact of his inebriation that mystified him, given the amount of alcohol he'd gulped during Luke's increasingly bizarre revelations, but that he felt so damn *good* about it. A bit sick, admittedly. Actually, a *lot* sick, but good nevertheless. Happy. Decidedly happy. The kind of happy that made a guy look back on his life and snort at the things that normally would make him wince.

Which confused the hell out of him.

The thing that had always prevented him from drinking to excess was that he never *had* been a happy drunk. He was a morose drinker. The few times in his life that he had turned to a bottle he'd found that alcohol honed pain rather than blunted it.

Yet somehow this scotch was slinking through his veins like a balm, smoothing the rough edges of his memory, filing all the sharp edges of his remembered hurts and fears.

Or maybe it was just that his death gave him a new perspective on his life.

The thought made him giggle, such an incongruous sound to escape from his own throat that he flushed scarlet and slapped his palm across his mouth in horror.

"Have another," Luke offered smoothly, and refilled Walter's scotch again.

"Don…don…wanna…make fool…of myself," Walter slurred.

"Don't be ridiculous. This is just *fun*, Walt. Of course I realize the concept is somewhat alien to you but if you want to fit in here you're just going to have to loosen up a little."

"M'sorry."

"Don't be," Luke chuckled. "Makes you far more 'interesting' than most of my visitors. It's a long time since a soul turned up in Purgatory needing lessons in how not to be 'good'.

~#~#~#~

"I told you I had everything under control," Gabriel announced, with a smirk of satisfaction.

"You call *this* 'under control'? What are you smoking, Gabriel?" Raphael snorted. "Though I suppose I should be privileged to watch you humiliate yourself in public like this."

"You're missing the point, as usual, Rafe. I should have known you'd be incapable of seeing the wider picture."

"Raphael's right," Michael interrupted. "This isn't a solution, it's a disaster. We should never have listened to you."

Gabriel curled his lip and glowered at Michael.

"If I throw a stick, will you leave?"

"Why not try throwing it and seeing if *that* leaves," Michael replied dryly.

Gabriel shrugged.

"So, okay, I admit I assumed he'd go to the 'other' place," he admitted. "I'm no happier about him being *here* than you are, but it's still proof that my plan worked."

"Luke's probably pissing himself over this," Raphael growled. "And when HE decides to find out why Luke is laughing his ass off, we're all going to be in the shit."

"It's just a small design flaw," Gabriel argued. "I'm playing with alien DNA, after all. You've got to expect a few teething problems. The important thing is that his presence here proves conclusively that this hybrid *did* host a soul and that Luke's wrong. We don't actually have to stop the colonization to avoid Judgment Day."

"If the price of collaborating with the aliens is that Heaven gets over run with murderous little scumbags like Billy Miles, I'll be moving to Purgatory myself," Michael replied, with a shudder.

"I admit I miscalculated the definition of a 'good' hybrid," Gabriel admitted reluctantly. "I suppose it should have occurred to me since HE designed the Aliens with the express purpose of killing humans. It seems that the balance of a soul in a hybrid body isn't affected by any behavior motivated by its alien genes. Still, look on the bright side. No matter what the hybrids do, we're guaranteed victory now. Every single soul born into a hybrid body will end up as a point for us, irrelevant of their behavior. So there's no need for Judgment Day, after all."

"Not if you don't mind sharing Heaven with a few billion homicidal maniacs," Raphael grunted. "If your plan works, I'm packing my bags too."

"See," Gabriel smirked nastily. "I knew there was a bright side to all this."

~#~#~#~

"Houston, we have a problem."

Both Luke and Walter snapped their heads around at the laconic voice but where Luke seemed merely irritated by the interruption, Walter was completely mortified by the arrival of Luke's unexpected guest. He desperately tried to sit up straight on the sunbed, rubbed self-consciously at the bar-b-que sauce that splattered his tee-shirt and prayed that his face wasn't as bright-red as the burning heat in his cheeks suggested.

Considering the glorious beings sprawled around the pool, the blond perfection of Luke and his earlier vision of Alex's true form, Walter was hesitant about even *thinking* the phrase "the most gorgeous creature he'd ever seen" since every time he turned around it seemed that the high-bar on that perception was lifted.

He desperately tried to explain that to little Wally, who unfortunately wasn't listening. He was too busy trying to jump up and wave an excited hello.

Walter quickly dropped his right hand into his lap and pressed the cold glass against his groin in the desperate hope that the now not-so-little Wally would take the hint and shrivel in shame.

"What is…" Luke began, then stiffened. "Ah. Of course. I should have anticipated something like this."

"I wouldn't have bothered you with it, but I just couldn't make my mind up which scenario was worse under the circumstances and Michael just won't listen to me," his visitor sighed.

As did Walter, as he pushed the glass harder against his suddenly adolescent cock and began to whisper dire threats at it under his breath.

"There isn't a *good* option, Mordad," Luke agreed. "But she's *yours* whatever happens so you've got the right to claim her early and, besides, the last thing Alex needs right now is for her to arrive and throw a spoke in the wheel."

Mordad sighed so deeply that the sound seemed to rustle through his ebony wings. His elegant mocha fingers caressed and tugged on his full lower lip, then slipped down to thoughtfully stroke the soft down on his chin.

"It's more complicated than that," he finally admitted, in a whisper of smoke and black velvet.

Walter closed his eyes and groaned.

"When isn't it?" Luke countered, with obvious irritation.

"There's 288 other people on that plane," Mordad mumbled miserably. "She goes; they go. It's gonna be a real mess."

"You've been HIS Angel of Death for three millennia, Mordad," Luke pointed out acerbically. "Don't you think it's a bit late in the day for you to decide blood makes you squeamish?"

"Blood?" Mordad repeated, his eyes wide in astonishment. "Fuck the blood, Luke. It's the damned paperwork that makes me squeamish! If that plane goes down, 289 souls are going to be taken out of turn. That's 289 fucking forms in triplicate trying to explain why I did it, and that's just the start! I finally file the paperwork and then the real fun begins. Have *you* ever stood in a room full of pissed off Guardian Angels trying to explain why you thought it would be a fun idea to get them demoted for negligence?"

"Blame Michael," Luke shrugged. "I really don't see that this is any of my concern, Mordad. While I don't approve of what he's doing, I'm certainly not going to interfere."

"I'm not asking you to interfere," Mordad replied. "I'm just here to ask if you've got a vacancy."

Walter took a hasty gulp of his scotch. It flared through his throat like fire and then joined the amber fog that was rising into his brain to replace the blood that was rushing southwards.

"A *permanent* vacancy?" Luke asked, his eyes lighting up considerably. "You're planning on quitting over this?"

Mordad shook his head. "No. I'm just going to 'forget' to crash that plane. So I need a place to lay low for a couple of weeks until Michael calms down."

"You'll be putting Alex in an awkward position," Luke replied, his eyes narrowing in thought, but then he shrugged and smirked. "Oh well. He's cute when he squirms."

"So I can stay?"

Walter hiccupped with excitement and then blushed furiously.

"Bit too crowded here at the moment," Luke replied.

Walter heard a whimper of disappointment, then realized with horror that the sound had come from his own throat and stuffed his knuckles in his mouth.

"You'll have to double up with someone if you want to stay at the main house," Luke continued, keeping a straight face with difficulty. "I'll have to see if anyone minds sharing."

Mordad flashed a wide, white-fanged smile directly at Walter.

"Is your room a double?" he purred.

The last of the blood ran out of Walter's head, straight down into his cock. Little Wally valiantly tried to make up for Walter's inability to speak by rearing up out of Walter's boxers and waving a frantic welcome.

Mordad's eyes dropped to Walter's lap, widened slightly and then he smirked and offered his hand to little Wally.

"Want to shake on it?" he asked.

Walter's chin hit the floor with a resounding thump.

"Was it something I said?" Mordad asked innocently, staring down at the deliciously edible man sprawled unconscious at his feet.

"That, and fourteen doubles on top of the shock of waking up dead this afternoon," Luke snorted. "Poor Walter. You have a surprisingly evil streak, Mordad. Are you absolutely *sure* you're not interested in a permanent position?"

"Hey, this is just a temporary aberration," Mordad chuckled. "I'm on vacation. When in Rome and all that." He reached down, picked Walter up one-handed, tucked him under his arm and walked into the house whistling.

Go to Part Eleven