Author: LegalBlonde
Email: legalblonde2005@yahoo.com
Classification: S/V angst.
Spoilers: Through "The Telling"
Distribution: CM; anyone else drop me a line so I can visit.
Disclaimer: Alias, et al belongs to JJ Abrams and others with money. I have no Alias, no et al, and no money. Don't sue.
Thanks: To carrielynn, my tireless beta, whose encouragement, insight and criticism helped mold this story.
Summary: Three realities, different yet not wholly separate, beginning in a Hong Kong alleyway. (Subtitle: If JJ can copy Run, Lola, Run, so can I.)
AN: Yes, there are three versions of reality in the fic. Each one is marked as a separate "deviation". It's an odd structure, but it comes together in the end.
Prologue (deviation one)
2005, june
"Syd... since that night... you were missing. You've been missing for almost two years."
She tries to blot out the words with the rough cotton of a cheap pillowcase, tries to bury the images in the exposed springs of a bare safehouse mattress. She shakes her head, wet hair flinging across her cheek, and rubs her eyes with callused fingers. But the words remain.
The images remain.
He promised to explain to her tomorrow -- tomorrow, he said, sitting awkwardly on the corner of his chair, hands on his knees, not meeting her eyes. Tomorrow.
"Sydney, you need to get some rest. Get checked out by a doctor. In the morning we can start to put all this together."
Together? No, nothing's coming together. It's nothing more than a cheap ploy to make her (him?) feel better about everything coming apart.
She's not sleeping this way. She pushes herself off the flimsy, dusty mattress on the floor of the safehouse, kicking back the scratchy wool blanket. She stands up, hand swinging in midair, grasping for the pull-chain connected to the bare bulb overhead. The yellow-toned light fills half the room, leaving the corners in shadow. She finds her boots against one wall, pants and turtleneck folded beside them.
The worst thing a person can do is nothing at all.
She uses her fingers to pry the tiny window open, pushing hard against the years of dust and corrosion. She finally gets it halfway, just enough to slither through, one leg, then torso, then her other leg. Hanging from the narrow sill, she hovers just four feet from the ground. She drops, swinging to one side, bracing herself for the pain that shoots through her ankles. She crouches for a moment, one hand on the ground, letting her joints recover. Then she begins moving, quickly, darting into shadows and out of alleys, keeping out of the omnipresent electricity and the surreal glow of every-color neon lights.
She needs only an hour to retrace her steps, winding back to the alley. Once there, she stops, catching her breath, heart pounding, eyes sweeping the place where everything began to fall apart. The images from her nightmares flood back to her with clarity. Her body jerks, her spine stiffens. She knows why she's come.
A glint of light catches her eye, and somehow that doesn't surprise her. She kneels down (ignoring the smell), pushing soggy newspapers aside to reveal a small silver knife. The ornate handle is filled with flowing script, and carved on the matching sheath is the eerily familiar symbol of an eye.
She's long past logic, past reason, past even emotion by this point. Her world has been reduced to three facts: this knife is here, it is here for her, and this reality somehow seems like no reality at all. She knows if she is to do anything, to have any hope, she will close her eyes, hold her breath, and do what her mind screams at her to stop.
Her heart pounds, but her hands do not shake, as the slides the knife from its sheath and slowly, carefully, draws the blade across the scar on her side.