For Peach

Bulldozing the offending mountain of mashed potatoes with my fork, swirling its twines through the soft mass until the gravy I poured over it spilled like dark lava through its snowy whiteness, I told myself that I just wasn’t as hungry as I’d thought I was.

My sudden disinterest in the food on my plate had nothing at all to do with the fact that the guy in the next booth had just ordered himself a steak the size of Wyoming that was still hissing and spitting its mouth-watering aroma in my direction. It couldn’t possibly be that scent which  turned the taste of my own dinner into ashes in my mouth. Impossible, because that would suggest I was feeling sorry for myself.

I don’t do self-pity.

So it was just co-incidence that my stump started to throb and itch in time with the stabbing motions of my right hand as it continued its massacre of Mount Potato.

Yeah.

I mean, let’s face it. I still can do practically anything I used to and that’s three times more than your average guy can do. So I was hardly going to get all riled up over something as fucking trivial as the fact I couldn’t figure out a way to cut up a steak in a public restaurant without turning myself into a performing freak show.

I just wasn’t hungry.

Okay, smartass, I agree the fact I was in a restaurant in the first place suggests that I may have been feeling a little peckish, but that just proves you know shit. Restaurants aren’t just about food. They’re little oases of light. Not stark light like the glare of a shopping mall that makes you feel exposed and vulnerable, but soft, warm, shadowed light that reminds you that you’re human. 

Contrary to popular opinion.

Besides, spending my evenings in restaurants saves me having to turn the heating on in my apartment. 

The only problem with public restaurants is that they are, by definition, public and that means they have a regrettable tendency to allow kids on the premises.  Don’t get me wrong, I like kids. Well, I don’t actually *like* them but I’m not allergic to them. As far as I’m concerned they have their place in the world. I just don’t think it’s in restaurants.

It’s a matter of hygiene, as much as anything else. Have you seen a kid eat?  Hell, I’ve seen dogs eat with less mess and certainly with less noise.  Some snot-nosed, dribbling three-year-old spitting food down their face to the accompaniment of raucous screaming is not my choice of an ideal dinner companion.

Which, I suppose, brings me to the point.

I’m an assassin, right?

No excuses, no apologies. Hell, it’s a living and, let’s face it, when someone’s number is up it’s up. End of story.  The way I see it, if someone is prepared to pay *someone* to do a little wet work, the money might as well go into my pocket as someone else’s. It’s just good business sense, isn’t it? It’s not like it’s *my* idea to kill someone. It’s going to happen anyway so, the way I figure it, the only difference between me doing it and someone else doing it is that this way I keep food in my belly and a roof over my head.

So we’re clear on that point, aren’t we?  I’m an assassin. I kill people for a living. It’s a talent I have that I’m quite happy to share with the world.

Fuck knows I can’t think of anything else I’m particularly good at.

Anyway, the bottom line is that I didn’t do it because I gave a shit about the kid, okay? I just…hell, it was self-preservation, okay?  That’s all.  It had nothing to do with trying to save the kid’s life. Nothing at all.

~#~#~#~#~  

Fuck, I hate hospitals. 

Of course, it’s not a Mulderesque, psychotic hatred. No one ever has to put *me* in five-point restraints just to get a shot at my ass. 

In my ass, dammit. I meant *in* my ass.

Where was I?  Oh yeah.  Hospitals. 

God-awful places, but undeniably useful. I guess they’re just a tool of the trade for an assassin.  Great place to do a hit. Even greater place to stagger into if something goes wrong and you end up with your guts spilling out of your belly. Although you run the risk of getting yourself stitched up in more ways than one if you’re unfortunate enough to stumble into the hands of that most rare commodity - a doctor who isn’t susceptible to bribes.

Great thing about doctors is that they almost *all* get married to women with trigger-happy credit cards. Sometimes I wonder whether there’s some kind of secret female consortium, the members of whom all vie for the supreme position of ‘woman who screwed the most cash out of the poor dick-driven bastard who fell for their vapid bleached-blonde blood-sucking bitch routine’.

I bet Marita’s heads-on favorite in the running for the position of supreme queen of Bitches Anonymous.  

Though the flowers she sent are pretty nice. A big, opulent display of Carolina Roses.  If they were from anyone but her, you’d just accept them as the gesture they appear. But, with Marita, nothing’s ever that straightforward so I guess she knows exactly what those particular flowers are saying.

/Love is dangerous./

Oh yeah, honey. Tell me about it.

Skinner’s flowers are harder to read. He just doesn’t have the cunning subtlety to say one thing with his mouth and another one with his gifts. Forget Sergei; that ‘S’ stands for ‘straightforward’.  He’s just not the bull-shitting type. So I figure the red roses were just the first bunch he saw when he stepped through the door of the florists. Hell, maybe he just phoned up with his credit card and told ‘em to send a bunch of flowers and they took the opportunity to rip him off.

Yeah.

But, I gotta admit, the fact he sent flowers at all is pretty weird.

Last time I saw him, I was bleeding out all over a concrete floor and he shot my fucking brains out.

I always assumed he dumped my body in a shallow grave because he didn’t have time to bury me properly. Now, I have to wonder whether he knew I was going to wake up three months later with a mother of a headache and less than 48 hours to claw my way out of the dirt before I turned into one of ‘them’.  Maybe the fact he left a vial of the antidote in my jacket pocket should have been a clue.

I never *could* figure out exactly how much he knew about what was really going on.

~#~#~#~#~  

 Shit.

 That had to be the most excruciatingly embarrassing moment of my life.

 And I’ve got a few to pick and choose from.

 I hate blubbering women. I think I hate them even more than snot-nosed, blubbering kids.  Having both in my hospital room at the same time was torture.

 And that guy?  The father? Hell, I think he was even worse.  Standing there, trying to be stoic, turning around every couple of minutes to wipe his eyes and muttering under his breath about hay-fever or some such crap.

 I am *not* a hero, okay?

 I’m an assassin.

 I’m the big, bad dude in the leather jacket who eats pussies like you for breakfast.

Talk to Mulder if you want to know what kind of scum-sucking rat-bastard I am. I’m sure he’d love to let you in on a few home truths about me.

Note the absence of any Mulder-flowers in this hospital room.

Another nice bunch from Skinner though…

Jonquil.

/Violent sympathy and desire/

…Decidedly worrying.

~#~#~#~#~  

Fucking aliens…

Would someone like to explain to me what the hell use they are? 

In return for your help to the resistance, Mr. Krycek, you’ve won the big one. The ultimate prize.  The thing that all men have sought for millennia. Immortality.  Say it quickly and it almost sounds like a good deal. We can guarantee that even a 9mm round in your forehead will only give you an unexpected three-month vacation in a muddy hole. You’ll wake up, right as rain, with only the minor inconvenience of a soul-stealing virus and, if you manage to avoid *that* little surprise time-bomb in your bloodstream, from then on even two rounds of a sawn-off shotgun in your guts will only be a temporary inconvenience.

Yeah.

Right.

Doesn’t stop it hurting like fuck, does it?

Shit. If I’d known how fucking long it would take for my shredded entrails to fuse back into my body I’d hardly have jumped between that crack-head and the sniveling brat, would I?

I don’t even *like* kids.

Why the hell did I do it?

I mean this is America. Land of the free to get high on drugs and shoot some screaming kid ‘cos he’s standing between you and the till you want to rob.

And Alex Asshole Krycek has to suddenly get religion, or something, and throw himself between the kid and the bullets.

Stupid fucker.

Kid’ll probably grow up to be the next Hitler or something. I’m lying here in hospital because I saved the life of some little bastard who’s probably fated to do more damage to this planet than the fucking aliens.

And Skinner is sending me flowers.

Hey hum…

Can anyone see the rabbit hole I fell down while I was re-enacting ‘Close Encounters’ with a plate of mashed potato?

~#~#~#~#~  

Gladioli.

What the fuck?

/I am really sincere/

Probably just got ‘em on offer, or something. Can’t see Skinner as the kind of guy who looks up trivial crap on the internet just so he can screw with someone’s head.  Anyway, how the hell would he know that *I* know?

It’s just a hobby, you know? Some people collect stamps. Me, I collect trivia.  You never know when some obscure, arcane bit of knowledge might get your ass out of a sling.

Fox ‘cock-of-the-walk’ Mulder isn’t the only guy with an eidetic memory around here. And how many languages can *he* speak?

Exactly.

He’s not all that, you know?

Well, sure, he’s kinda cute in a pouty, pretentious kind of way, and I’d be lying if I said I never fantasized about fucking more than his head. Fox Mulder is way hot, admittedly, but I’ve given up masochism for lent.  

~#~#~#~#~  

That’s it…

 I’ve officially fallen into the twilight zone.

 Peonies.

 Fucking peonies.

 Now tell me I’m imagining things!

 /Healing, Life, Happy Marriage, Gay life/

 Gay fucking life???

 Walter ‘S for Sex-god’ Skinner is coming on to me.

 Halle-fucking-lujah.

 Maybe I *am* getting religion. Think if I drop to my knees and pray real hard I’ll find something worth worshipping when I open my eyes?

 Jeez, Walter. Cut the crappy flowers already and get your cute ass in here. I guarantee I can come up with my own non-verbal form of communication and it’s a hell of a lot more satisfying than yours.  

~#~#~#~#~  

Okay. 

Time to play hardball.

 Fuck my image. If Walter Stoneface Skinner can send a guy flowers, so can I.  Besides, ‘When in Rome’ is practically number one rule in the Assassin’s handbook.

 You wanna get close to a hit; you speak to him in his own language. Puts ‘em at ease. Makes ‘em think you’re both singing from the same song sheet. Softens ‘em up for the kill.

 So to speak.

 Thank fucking god I had my wallet on me when I got wasted this time. American Express is your friend and you need one hell of a good friend to track down a florist who has a flowering pot of Gloxinia at this time of year.

 /Love at first sight/

 Fuck. What if he thinks I’m taking the piss?

 Funny, isn’t it? 

 It’s the first time I’ve ever been straight with him. It’s the first time I’ve told him the complete, unabridged truth. 

 And he’s not going to believe a fucking word of it.

 Why the hell would he?

 But, oh god, what if he does?

 Honesty’s one hell of a two-edged sword and I’ve just given Skinner one fuck of a weapon to use against me.  

~#~#~#~#~  

Roses.

Hand-delivered.

Peach roses.

Fucking PEACH roses.

And I can’t believe it. I can’t fucking believe it. I can’t fucking believe he knows what peach roses actually *mean*.

He can’t, can he?

I mean, hello, this is *me*. Alex Krycek. Remember? The guy who actually deserved it when you shot him like a dog in that basement garage. The guy who was too busy trying to save his ass, and incidentally the ass of every other fucker on this planet, from an imminent alien invasion to ask you ‘nicely’ to co-operate in his one-man plan to save the world. The guy who offered you his ass one long-ago night and was too fucking stupid to realize your horrified refusal had nothing to do with a lack of attraction but a hell of a lot to do with the idea he’d whore himself just to avoid a night on a freezing balcony.

Peach roses.

/Closing of the deal/

Well, fuck me.

And from the look in his eyes, I think he just might.

The End

(Although, if this little tale intrigued you....the *whole* story, from Walter's POV is "Sealed With A Kiss")