The Gigolo of Dejalo
Deslea R. Judd
Copyright 2008
DISCLAIMER: Characters not mine. Interpretation mine.
ARCHIVE: Yes, just keep my name and headers.
FANDOM: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and The X Files
RATING: PG.
SPOILERS/TIMEFRAME: TSCC - to Mr Ferguson, XF - whole series.
CATEGORY/KEYWORDS: Crossover, Sarah, Krycek, no romance.
SUMMARY: Sarah meets up with a blast from the past. Written for a Christmas crossover challenge.
MORE STORIES: http://fiction.deslea.com
FEEDBACK: Love the stuff. deslea@deslea.com
'Hello, Sarah,' wafted an ironic drawl from the living room. It was a languid sound, no less so for Sarah and Derek’s whiplash reply of rifles on shoulders.
'You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,' Sarah said, allowing her hand to slacken again as they came into full view of the room. She didn’t put the weapon down.
'No joke, Turtle Dove. Running Bear has returned to the fold.' Alex Krycek was sitting there on her couch, stretched out as though he lived there.
'Oh, please. And get your feet off my coffee table.' She kicked the offending limbs before he had a chance to comply of his own accord.
'Nice digs, Turtle Dove. Bigger than you had in Dejalo.'
'Bigger gun, too.'
Derek spoke for the first time. 'And a better-looking sidekick. Who is this guy? An ex?'
Krycek lifted his hand. 'Steady on there, big boy. I’m spoken for these days. And no, not an ex.'
'It was a joke,' Sarah said to Derek, finally putting her rifle down. 'He was Running Bear, but I wasn’t White Dove because I was about the only woman in Dejalo he wasn’t screwing around with.'
'So you were Turtle Dove.'
'Right.' Sarah turned back to Krycek. 'There’s a bit less of you than last time I saw you. Battle wound?'
Krycek looked puzzled, but then he waved a prosthetic hand in her general direction. 'Indirectly. It was a long time ago – getting on for ten years.' Sarah mentally translated that into her years and realised it had happened maybe a year and a half before they jumped, a few months after she last saw him.
'Metal?' Derek asked.
'No, a bunch of superstitious but well-meaning humans. Possibly a worse breed than metal. They thought they were protecting me from being made into one.'
'In Mexico?' Sarah was instantly on the alert.
'No, Russia. For a while there, a whole bunch of people in the US and Russia believed the metal developed from an alien pathogen, and were busily re-creating the Cold War over it. That all ended eight or nine years ago, though. These days, metal has replaced most of them, so there’s no one left to argue about how it started.'
Derek sat down facing Krycek. 'You don’t sound too cut up about it.'
'It had its benefits for me. I was replaced, too.'
'And it was killed by one of your many enemies?' Sarah guessed. She was almost smiling.
Krycek gave a single nod. 'You know me too well.'
Derek looked up at Sarah. 'Does he have a name? I mean, besides Running Bear?'
'Several. But you can call me Krycek.' Krycek hesitated, then leaned over and offered his hand.
Derek hesitated too, but took it. 'Derek.'
Sarah’s voice was warm with reluctant amusement. She could afford that warmth, because whatever else Krycek was, he was never, ever the weak link in the armour, and right now that was comforting. 'Krycek, what are you doing here?'
Krycek looked up at her, and she was startled to see sympathy in his expression. She wondered fleetingly what had happened to him in the last ten years. 'I still have a few old ladyfriends in Dejalo, Sarah. I heard what happened down there. I heard about John still being a boy and the silly girl he was calling his wife and some very strange goings-on on the Day of the Dead. Fortunately most of the villagers dismissed the stories as an elaborate prank, but some – sisters and wives of the policia – knew better.'
'How you found us is an interesting question,' Sarah said, 'but I’ll settle for why.'
It was Krycek’s turn to sound amused. 'If you must know, my wife told me to come. She’s had her own dealings with metal. We thought you might need backup.'
'Who’s your wife?' Derek asked. 'Do we know her?'
Krycek’s face darkened. 'I’ve gone to great pains to get her away from all this – at least as far as any of us can be. No, you don’t know her. You never will.'
'Maimed?' asked Sarah softly.
'Aren’t we all?' Krycek stood up. 'So how about it, Sarah? Do you need backup? Because if you don’t, there’s a plane ticket with one of my names on it.'
'Running Bear, I suppose,' Derek muttered.
Krycek shot him a look that seemed to say, Wouldn’t you like to know?
Sarah thought about it. Twice now she had refused additions to the crew, as Derek put it. Charley would almost certainly have been a liability, as much as she loved him. Ellison – well, who knew. He had more street smarts than most FBI agents she’d come across, but he was no guerrilla fighter.
But Krycek was different. Krycek was a survivor. She would never have to teach him or help him. He might double-cross her to survive, but he would never double-cross John or the future. He could work with Derek and he could work with metal. He could do almost anything she could do, and some things that she couldn’t.
And who knew. With another survivor to back her up, maybe she could afford to take a chance on a question mark like Ellison, and the others who might cross their paths in the future. Maybe there would be more fighters as a result.
Yes, she thought, this was the one she was meant to say yes to.
'All right.' She held out her hand. Krycek took it.
'Do I get a say?'
Derek sounded belligerent, but she thought it was mostly for show. 'Nope,' she said without looking at him.
Krycek picked up a large bag from beside him. 'Derek, why don’t you show me where we keep our guns?'
Derek looked appraisingly at the bag and brightened noticeably. 'Now I see why she likes you. This way.'
Sarah smirked, watching them leave. She called, 'Krycek, you’ll be sleeping on the floor. Just so you know.'
'Turtle Dove,' he called back over his shoulder, 'I wouldn’t expect anything else.'
END
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