"If it's a fake, it's an incredibly good one," Langly said, looking at a high-resolution scan he'd made from one of the original Polaroids. He zoomed in on Jimmy's chest and ran his finger along it. "See, you can see the individual hairs that are stuck to the grease pencil markings."

"I think at this point we should assume they're real," Byers said, awkwardly crossing his legs.

"They're real, all right," Frohike said, looking at a physical picture under a low-power optical microscope. "This was directly exposed onto this Polaroid film. It's no ink jet." He looked up. "He's really gotten himself into trouble this time."

"You can't blame Jimmy for being taken in by Krycek," Byers protested. "You're forgetting that he even fooled Mulder and Skinner once. Jimmy's only mistake was being too trusting. That, and being associated with people someone like Krycek would target. Us."

"No one ever asked him to," Frohike said. "I wanted to get rid of him."

"But not like this," Byers said.

"No, of course not! Anyway, it was getting so I didn't mind having him around so much."

There was a long uncomfortable silence. Finally Langly said, "Those beer bottles with Krycek's instructions--"

"No! There's got to be another way," Byers said firmly.

"Your call, man," Langly said.

Byers wished he could just pass out from exhaustion and escape the responsibility. Let Langly and Frohike do whatever it took to get Jimmy back. Byers would wake up and find him safe, and his conscience would be clear of whatever it was they'd decided to do while he was out of it. But that would be the coward's way out.

Just at the moment, Jimmy felt that Krycek was the nicest kidnapper ever. Not only had he given in to his pleas to turn on the TV before he left, he'd even let Jimmy have the remote. He'd done something to the innards of the remote to keep him from using the Guest Services menu button, like he really thought Jimmy could figure out a way to get help that way. He also disabled the volume control and mute, leaving it turned up pretty loud. But the all-important channel button was fully functional, and this motel subscribed to all his favorite channels. With his hands chained over his head, he had to hold it with an awkward grip and work the buttons by feel, but he soon got the hang of it, and was happily channel surfing. Never mind that he was chained up and theoretically a prisoner -- having the control of the remote was true American freedom!

When Krycek came back from his mysterious errand, Jimmy expected him to turn off the TV or at least take the remote away. Instead, after greeting him in as offhanded and friendly a manner as if Jimmy was just his roommate lying on the bed watching TV in his shorts, Alex put away a few things and opened the door in the wall opposite the bathroom. There was another door behind it, already ajar. It must be an adjoining room, just like the one in that POE embassy. Krycek disappeared through the doorway and shut the far door.

Jimmy shrugged and went back to watching The Simpsons. He dozed off toward the end of Malcolm in the Middle and woke up in time for the ten o'clock news. He wasn't surprised that his kidnapping didn't rate a mention. His friends probably hadn't even reported it to the police. They didn't trust the authorities much. If they had, his fate probably didn't interest the rest of the world enough to make the news. He was pretty sure they were trying hard to find him, and that was what was important.

"Bad luck," Langly said. "Not a single one of the spy satellites we know about was watching the beach when he left."

"I don't think luck had anything to do with it," Byers said. "I'm sure Krycek timed it that way."

"Well, for once I wish we hadn't picked this place where we did." One of the charms of HQ was that the buildings on either side of the alley blocked the view from the sky, unless a satellite passed directly overhead, in which case it would have a brief chance to image the roofs of the cars. None of the spy satellites they knew about had orbits that would allow even that. They'd chosen this location carefully, to protect their own privacy from spying governmental eyes. Now it had backfired: they had no idea what kind of car Krycek was driving, and there was no chance of tracking his departure with Jimmy from HQ.

"Thanks for looking, anyway," Byers said.

"Look, man, I'm sorry about doubting the picture," Langly said, sounding like he was on the verge of tears. It was obvious that he realized that his complacency had endangered Jimmy's life, and was feeling guilty.

"And," Frohike added, "about watching the babes on the beach when we should have been watching you, buddy." He thought about that. "Er, I mean..."

"What's important is that you're working on it now, that that there's still time to help him," Byers said. "Any luck with the hotel databases?"

Krycek really had style. If Jimmy was going to be hand-fed while he was bound and helpless, he had to admit that grapes were a great choice. As the other man leaned over him and popped the sweet round globes into his mouth, one at a time, giving him time to savor each one, Jimmy could almost fantasize that Krycek was his slave, instead of the other way around. Krycek had left his own shirt unbuttoned in the warm motel room. Jimmy could easily imagine that they were both wearing Greek togas, or maybe less.

Krycek mentioned something about grapes being high in boron, "an important element for assembling molecules in the body." Jimmy was more concerned with how good it tasted, and with the not unpleasant intimacy of the other man leaning against him as he fed him. Jimmy was touched by his captor's thoughtfulness in picking up fresh food for his prisoner. He could have kept him alive with less trouble by feeding him some much less tasty gruel. Maybe Alex wasn't such a bad guy, despite being a liar and a kidnapper and all.

Krycek's web site now had a form for submitting the required stolen information and claims about erased information. Byers noticed that for this, Krycek had installed a secure sockets layer. He was still sending the increasingly humiliating images of Jimmy across the net in the clear, though.

It also had a countdown timer reminding them that there was less than two hours left before his first breakin was due. It mockingly advised them "to allow up to two business days for the package to be delivered," but chillingly promised that "the parts will be shipped promptly."

All three of them worked late into the night, hoping that Krycek hadn't covered quite all of his tracks.