Title: What Never Dies
Author : Vilandra
E-mail: sydney_bristow25@yahoo.com
feedback: Yes, please, give feedback!! It would make my day
distribution: CD, everyone else please ask first.
disclaimer: Alias, and all characters, are not mine. They are the property of ABC, Touchtone, JJ Abrams, and Bad Robot Productions. I make no profit from this--I do it merely out of a love for the show. The title of the story, as well as all song lyrics throughout, are the property of Sense Field.
summary: Part 1/?--Sydney's identity is discovered by an unknown source. She and Vaughn fight to stay alive long enough to take down SD-6 once and for all, while searching for the people who know their truth.
rating: PG-13
Classification: Action-adventure, suspense
AN: I hate first chapters...they're always so boring! Basically, this is just setting up the fic, and I know it drones on at times...bear with me though, I swear this will be more complex than the gazillion other fics out there with the same premise!
Chapter One
Eyes like a searchlight at night, aimed at the sky...
There ain't no doubt, they'll shoot you out, for what you're about, dodging these bullets they aim for you.
It started out as a normal day, as I'm sure they all do. Bad things always seem to happen on fabulous days. The day my mother died—or, rather, willingly abandoned me as part of her twisted plot—was like any other; I bounded around the kitchen in my Winnie the Pooh pajamas as my mother cooked me scrambled eggs—scrambled eggs. How normal. That evening, I was as excited as any little girl to have a babysitter—a 16 year old, as grown up as I could ever hope to be, who braided my hair and regaled me with big- girl stories of high school as my world turned inside out around me. My life ended on a normal day.
This time was to be no different; however, it didn't end with a car crash, it simply marked the beginning of the torturously slow rot that would eat away my life. I began my day with a five-mile run; seemingly endless laps around the track as I prepared for another day at SD-6. The note on my desk from my father, asking me to join him for lunch that day, was unusual but not unheard of; father-daughter bonding must include the occasional lunch, right?
As luck would have it, he picked the noisiest restaurant in LA for us; filled with blaring music, televisions showing various sporting events, and noisy lunchers feeling the need to shout to one another across the great chasm known as a table. I was surprised at the choice; it didn't strike me as very Jack Bristow-like, but I chalked it up to a desire for some element of normalcy in our lives.
The overly cheerful waitress slid our hamburgers onto the table, and I turned to thank her. When I looked back at my plate, hungrily anticipating this normal hamburger, I saw the manila folder he had set next to the plate. It hit me—lunch, the noisy restaurant, was so we could speak without being heard. We weren't eating a meal as a normal father and daughter, we were eating a meal as spies under the ruse of normalcy.
I looked up at him questioningly, and his eyes silently implored me to look in the folder. "This was on my front stoop last night," he said softly, taking a bite of his burger. I gently lifted the folder open, and felt my stomach crash to the floor.
Pictures. Pictures of me, and Vaughn. Meeting at the warehouse, the observatory, the street corner. Exchanging glances, files, Christmas present. Oh. My God. I was exposed.
"Wh—what is this?" I whispered desperately, slamming the folder closed violently. For the first time ever, I wished feverently that this was a question of our relationship—I would have cherished questions about the propriety of our relationship, the nature of the gift, CIA protocol. Anything but what I knew these pictures were really about.
"I have no idea where this came from," he said softly, his eyes full of fear. "I have no idea who took these, who knows, why they were given to me—no idea."
I wanted to get up and run, leave the maddeningly noisy restaurant and LA and SD-6 and the CIA behind and just go. I had no idea how I was going to survive this—I had survived questions, lie detector tests, assassination attempts. But never pictures—never this.
I forced myself to take a bite of my hamburger and think rationally. "Okay—it could be K-Directorate, or another agency, looking to blackmail us. It could be—I don't know!" Desperation started to take over. "Could it be SD-6? Could they know?"
He shook his head. "If they had conformation like this, you would be dead." I shuddered—how many times had this fear crossed through my mind? "My guess is another agency, looking to blackmail you and I, or the CIA, someone."
My mind raced. How long did I have, before SD-6 got those pictures? How could I possibly stop it? "So, what do we do now?" I demanded. Daddy, please, have an answer, please make this right, the little girl who still thought her daddy could make everything in the world right called out. He put his hand on top of the folder, slid it back into his briefcase, and gave me too simple of an answer.
"We wait."
The afternoon back at SD-6 was, simply put, hellish. I sat there in that briefing room, pretending to love Marshall, adore Sloane; pretending that I wasn't scared to death of nearly every person in that office. Pretending that half of me didn't believe I might not even make it out of the building. Dixon and I were briefed on our mission to Paris; another villain, another computer disk, another countermission. I arrived home on edge, waiting for the inevitable assassin to leap out of the shadows. This was, of course, the evening Will decided pizza and movies would be absolutely fantastic, and he was already camped out on my couch.
"How's it goin', Syd?" he asked the minute I walked in the door, and I plastered on my signature grin, silently cursing him for being so damn chipper. "Ready for a movie night?"
"Oh, really, tonight?" I asked him as I set down my briefcase, forcing myself to sound as carefree as possible. "I was kind of just planning on getting to sleep early—I had a rough day." Understatement of the century.
Will was determined not to give up. "Sorry, Syd—ya don't have a choice in the matter. Pizza's on its way, Francie went to rent a movie, and you're not getting out of it." Sighing, I sat down on the couch, putting my feet up on the coffee table. Just be nice, just be pleasant. It's not Will's fault that people are intent on destroying my life.
The pizza boy arrived just as Francie got home with the movie. Deciding that I would make every effort possible to be downright pleasant to Francie and Will, I got myself a slice of pepperoni and returned to the couch. "So, what'd ya get, Fran?" I asked her, taking a bite of my pizza.
"Goldeneye—classic James Bond movie!" she announced, and I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. How ironic is my life??
"Classic? Hardly!" Will challenged, sitting next to me on the couch. "Pierce Brosnan—give me a break. Sean Connery. Now that's classic."
"Whatever, he's still hot," Francie laughed as the movie started. Thanks, Fran. Thanks for helping me take my mind of the world of espionage.
About ten minutes into the movie, the phone rang. Will jumped up to get the phone in the kitchen, and I turned to Francie. "Since when does he answer our phone?" I asked her, and she grinned. "Since he started eating every meal here, I guess."
I heard Will talking, and my ears pricked up. "No, this isn't Joey's Pizza—what the hell is Joey's Pizza, anyway? Why don't you just call Pizza Hut, or something?" My heart sank. As much as Vaughn needed to know what was going on, I really didn't feel like having that conversation. At all. How do you tell a man that his life's in danger like that, anyway? 'Oh, by the way, we've been made—pack your bags and pray you can make it to the airport?' Suddenly, the pepperoni pizza that had looked so delicious just moments before was the last thing I wanted in my stomach.
"Stupid pizza place," Will muttered, settling back into the couch. I stared blankly at the TV for a couple of minutes, thinking of nothing but Vaughn, the pictures. Imagining the look on his face as I told him that his world had just been turned upside down, his life destroyed. After a couple of minutes, I got off the couch and headed for the freezer. Opening it, I feigned surprise and shut it again. "Darn—we're out of ice cream. That sounds so good right now…does anyone else feel like ice cream?"
"But, Syd—we have those chocolate chip cookies I baked yesterday," Francie said, raising her eyebrows at me. "Why don't you just have those?"
"Yeah, I know—I just really want ice cream," I said lightly, trying to sound disappointed. "I think I'm going to run out and get some—anyone want?"
"You're gonna miss the movie for ice cream?" Will asked me, sounding completely baffled. Both he and Francie started at me blankly, as I stood like an idiot in the kitchen.
"Yeah, well, I've already seen it," I said, grabbing my keys and heading for the door. "I'll be back soon!"
"Okay…" Francie said, and I slammed the door behind me. My eyes stung with tears as I hurried to my car—all I wanted was a movie night with my best friends, and I had just lied to them. Again.
The drive to the warehouse seemed endless, and I checked my review mirror about every 3 seconds for tails. Finally, I arrived, and walked into the eerie green glow of the warehouse.
Vaughn stood in our usual meeting spot, looking completely casual—excited, actually. He opened the door for me, and I stepped in quickly, my hands shaking. Vaughn leaned up against the chain-link wall, and started right away. "Your countermission for Paris is simple—dead-drop at the airport so we can make copies. We have reason to believe the intel is extremely important, and might help us to…" he trailed off when he looked at my face; the complete lack of color, my eyes darting nervously around the room. "Syd…what's going on?"
I drew in a shaky breath, trying to calm myself enough to speak. I had been hoping that Vaughn had already found out about the pictures, somehow, but it was obvious that he had no idea. Finally, I just looked him straight in the eyes, and spoke. "Someone knows about us. About this."
A thousand emotions ran through Vaughn's eyes in an instant—fear, confusion, utter panic. His jaw dropped, and he simply asked, "What?"
I closed my eyes and tried to think of the words to say, any possible way to lessen this terrible news. Unable to think of anything, I decided to simply tell him everything. "Someone left pictures on my father's doorstep last night—surveillance pictures, of us. Us talking, on the street, in here, exchanging information—everything. We're exposed."
Vaughn looked as if I had punched him in the stomach—the color drained from his face, and his mouth hung open slightly. "Oh my God…this isn't happening," he whispered. I felt so sorry for him—I deserved all of this. I was the one double-crossing SD-6. But Vaughn—he was just a man who wanted to serve his country. He had friends, a mother, a bulldog—and I had shot that all to hell. He shouldn't be killed on account of me making the stupidest decision of my life when I was 19, and the most dangerous at 26.
"I…I…I don't know what to do," I responded helplessly, and suddenly wanted to cry. I just couldn't help it anymore—the lies, the secrecy, was simply too overwhelming. The tears I had held back earlier rushed to the surface of my eyes, threatening to expose my fragility. "I don't know how I'm going to get out of this—we! You, Vaughn—this isn't fair to you!" I cried, becoming desperate, and a tear spilled out onto my cheek.
"Syd, Syd, let's try to think rationally here," he pleaded, and I fought to drain the tears from my eyes. "Whoever it is, doesn't seem to have gone to SD-6…they must have some other motive." I nodded, forcing myself to concentrate on what he was saying. "If they did, we would be…" he stopped himself from finishing the sentence. We would be dead, I thought to myself bitterly. "We would know that they knew," he finished. I nodded. "The question is…who is it? Who took these pictures? Who wants us to know we've been made?"
After what seemed like an eternity of silence, I decided to speak. "Could it be another agency, looking to blackmail me for intel about SD-6?" He nodded, acknowledging this as a possibility. "It could be K- Directorate, Khisanau…could there be a mole in the Agency?" This last possibility scared me more than anything else—the CIA was the truth in what I was doing, my only safety. If I couldn't trust them…
"I don't know," he whispered, staring down at his hands. "It's a possibility…it would make sense."
"How would any other agency ever think of this, think to track me down…it just doesn't make sense." I felt defeated. It was the only possibility. "But, God…who could it be? What do we do?"
Vaughn sighed, and looked up at me. "If we report this to Devlin, tell him our suspicions—the mole would find out. That would be..."
He trailed off, and the true weight of the situation hit me like a brick wall. It hit me that we truly could be killed for this. I turned to him, my eyes full of fear, and finished his sentence. "…disastrous."
"Well, what are we supposed to do?" I spat out desperately, almost angrily. "Go on with our lives, pretend that we're not a step away from disaster? How do we do that? Aren't there any other options?"
"We flee," Vaughn replied simply, and I shook my head with determination. "We run, we get the hell out of here—and if we tell Devlin about this, we'll be forced into the Protection Program. He would never allow us to stay."
"I'm not hiding—I won't allow this person to take my life from me," I said with determination, and Vaughn nodded his head, almost hesitantly. "It seems as if this person, this agency, is looking for blackmail—I guess we wait and find out what they want?" I meant it to be a statement, but it came across as a question—because I had no idea what one did in a situation like this.
Vaughn looked up at me, into my eyes. "Sydney—whatever you do, whatever happens, we're in this together. And we will get through this together. I will not abandon you." I stared into his eyes, and saw that he was telling the truth—he would never leave me to get through this myself. After a minute, he spoke again. "I know this mission to Paris is the last thing on your mind—but it's an important one." I looked at him with curiosity. "The information you're being sent to retrieve—it's vital intel about the agency, about its inner workings. If—when," he corrected himself quickly, "we acquire this, it will be a crushing blow to SD-6." His eyes flashed with determination. "With this, Sydney—SD-6's end will actually be in sight."
My heart leapt—end. In sight. The words didn't even sound real. But this made up my mind. "It's settled, then," I said with conviction. "There's no way in hell I'm fleeing."
Author : Vilandra
E-mail: sydney_bristow25@yahoo.com
feedback: Yes, please, give feedback!! It would make my day
distribution: CD, everyone else please ask first.
disclaimer: Alias, and all characters, are not mine. They are the property of ABC, Touchtone, JJ Abrams, and Bad Robot Productions. I make no profit from this--I do it merely out of a love for the show. The title of the story, as well as all song lyrics throughout, are the property of Sense Field.
summary: Part 1/?--Sydney's identity is discovered by an unknown source. She and Vaughn fight to stay alive long enough to take down SD-6 once and for all, while searching for the people who know their truth.
rating: PG-13
Classification: Action-adventure, suspense
AN: I hate first chapters...they're always so boring! Basically, this is just setting up the fic, and I know it drones on at times...bear with me though, I swear this will be more complex than the gazillion other fics out there with the same premise!
Chapter One
Eyes like a searchlight at night, aimed at the sky...
There ain't no doubt, they'll shoot you out, for what you're about, dodging these bullets they aim for you.
It started out as a normal day, as I'm sure they all do. Bad things always seem to happen on fabulous days. The day my mother died—or, rather, willingly abandoned me as part of her twisted plot—was like any other; I bounded around the kitchen in my Winnie the Pooh pajamas as my mother cooked me scrambled eggs—scrambled eggs. How normal. That evening, I was as excited as any little girl to have a babysitter—a 16 year old, as grown up as I could ever hope to be, who braided my hair and regaled me with big- girl stories of high school as my world turned inside out around me. My life ended on a normal day.
This time was to be no different; however, it didn't end with a car crash, it simply marked the beginning of the torturously slow rot that would eat away my life. I began my day with a five-mile run; seemingly endless laps around the track as I prepared for another day at SD-6. The note on my desk from my father, asking me to join him for lunch that day, was unusual but not unheard of; father-daughter bonding must include the occasional lunch, right?
As luck would have it, he picked the noisiest restaurant in LA for us; filled with blaring music, televisions showing various sporting events, and noisy lunchers feeling the need to shout to one another across the great chasm known as a table. I was surprised at the choice; it didn't strike me as very Jack Bristow-like, but I chalked it up to a desire for some element of normalcy in our lives.
The overly cheerful waitress slid our hamburgers onto the table, and I turned to thank her. When I looked back at my plate, hungrily anticipating this normal hamburger, I saw the manila folder he had set next to the plate. It hit me—lunch, the noisy restaurant, was so we could speak without being heard. We weren't eating a meal as a normal father and daughter, we were eating a meal as spies under the ruse of normalcy.
I looked up at him questioningly, and his eyes silently implored me to look in the folder. "This was on my front stoop last night," he said softly, taking a bite of his burger. I gently lifted the folder open, and felt my stomach crash to the floor.
Pictures. Pictures of me, and Vaughn. Meeting at the warehouse, the observatory, the street corner. Exchanging glances, files, Christmas present. Oh. My God. I was exposed.
"Wh—what is this?" I whispered desperately, slamming the folder closed violently. For the first time ever, I wished feverently that this was a question of our relationship—I would have cherished questions about the propriety of our relationship, the nature of the gift, CIA protocol. Anything but what I knew these pictures were really about.
"I have no idea where this came from," he said softly, his eyes full of fear. "I have no idea who took these, who knows, why they were given to me—no idea."
I wanted to get up and run, leave the maddeningly noisy restaurant and LA and SD-6 and the CIA behind and just go. I had no idea how I was going to survive this—I had survived questions, lie detector tests, assassination attempts. But never pictures—never this.
I forced myself to take a bite of my hamburger and think rationally. "Okay—it could be K-Directorate, or another agency, looking to blackmail us. It could be—I don't know!" Desperation started to take over. "Could it be SD-6? Could they know?"
He shook his head. "If they had conformation like this, you would be dead." I shuddered—how many times had this fear crossed through my mind? "My guess is another agency, looking to blackmail you and I, or the CIA, someone."
My mind raced. How long did I have, before SD-6 got those pictures? How could I possibly stop it? "So, what do we do now?" I demanded. Daddy, please, have an answer, please make this right, the little girl who still thought her daddy could make everything in the world right called out. He put his hand on top of the folder, slid it back into his briefcase, and gave me too simple of an answer.
"We wait."
The afternoon back at SD-6 was, simply put, hellish. I sat there in that briefing room, pretending to love Marshall, adore Sloane; pretending that I wasn't scared to death of nearly every person in that office. Pretending that half of me didn't believe I might not even make it out of the building. Dixon and I were briefed on our mission to Paris; another villain, another computer disk, another countermission. I arrived home on edge, waiting for the inevitable assassin to leap out of the shadows. This was, of course, the evening Will decided pizza and movies would be absolutely fantastic, and he was already camped out on my couch.
"How's it goin', Syd?" he asked the minute I walked in the door, and I plastered on my signature grin, silently cursing him for being so damn chipper. "Ready for a movie night?"
"Oh, really, tonight?" I asked him as I set down my briefcase, forcing myself to sound as carefree as possible. "I was kind of just planning on getting to sleep early—I had a rough day." Understatement of the century.
Will was determined not to give up. "Sorry, Syd—ya don't have a choice in the matter. Pizza's on its way, Francie went to rent a movie, and you're not getting out of it." Sighing, I sat down on the couch, putting my feet up on the coffee table. Just be nice, just be pleasant. It's not Will's fault that people are intent on destroying my life.
The pizza boy arrived just as Francie got home with the movie. Deciding that I would make every effort possible to be downright pleasant to Francie and Will, I got myself a slice of pepperoni and returned to the couch. "So, what'd ya get, Fran?" I asked her, taking a bite of my pizza.
"Goldeneye—classic James Bond movie!" she announced, and I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. How ironic is my life??
"Classic? Hardly!" Will challenged, sitting next to me on the couch. "Pierce Brosnan—give me a break. Sean Connery. Now that's classic."
"Whatever, he's still hot," Francie laughed as the movie started. Thanks, Fran. Thanks for helping me take my mind of the world of espionage.
About ten minutes into the movie, the phone rang. Will jumped up to get the phone in the kitchen, and I turned to Francie. "Since when does he answer our phone?" I asked her, and she grinned. "Since he started eating every meal here, I guess."
I heard Will talking, and my ears pricked up. "No, this isn't Joey's Pizza—what the hell is Joey's Pizza, anyway? Why don't you just call Pizza Hut, or something?" My heart sank. As much as Vaughn needed to know what was going on, I really didn't feel like having that conversation. At all. How do you tell a man that his life's in danger like that, anyway? 'Oh, by the way, we've been made—pack your bags and pray you can make it to the airport?' Suddenly, the pepperoni pizza that had looked so delicious just moments before was the last thing I wanted in my stomach.
"Stupid pizza place," Will muttered, settling back into the couch. I stared blankly at the TV for a couple of minutes, thinking of nothing but Vaughn, the pictures. Imagining the look on his face as I told him that his world had just been turned upside down, his life destroyed. After a couple of minutes, I got off the couch and headed for the freezer. Opening it, I feigned surprise and shut it again. "Darn—we're out of ice cream. That sounds so good right now…does anyone else feel like ice cream?"
"But, Syd—we have those chocolate chip cookies I baked yesterday," Francie said, raising her eyebrows at me. "Why don't you just have those?"
"Yeah, I know—I just really want ice cream," I said lightly, trying to sound disappointed. "I think I'm going to run out and get some—anyone want?"
"You're gonna miss the movie for ice cream?" Will asked me, sounding completely baffled. Both he and Francie started at me blankly, as I stood like an idiot in the kitchen.
"Yeah, well, I've already seen it," I said, grabbing my keys and heading for the door. "I'll be back soon!"
"Okay…" Francie said, and I slammed the door behind me. My eyes stung with tears as I hurried to my car—all I wanted was a movie night with my best friends, and I had just lied to them. Again.
The drive to the warehouse seemed endless, and I checked my review mirror about every 3 seconds for tails. Finally, I arrived, and walked into the eerie green glow of the warehouse.
Vaughn stood in our usual meeting spot, looking completely casual—excited, actually. He opened the door for me, and I stepped in quickly, my hands shaking. Vaughn leaned up against the chain-link wall, and started right away. "Your countermission for Paris is simple—dead-drop at the airport so we can make copies. We have reason to believe the intel is extremely important, and might help us to…" he trailed off when he looked at my face; the complete lack of color, my eyes darting nervously around the room. "Syd…what's going on?"
I drew in a shaky breath, trying to calm myself enough to speak. I had been hoping that Vaughn had already found out about the pictures, somehow, but it was obvious that he had no idea. Finally, I just looked him straight in the eyes, and spoke. "Someone knows about us. About this."
A thousand emotions ran through Vaughn's eyes in an instant—fear, confusion, utter panic. His jaw dropped, and he simply asked, "What?"
I closed my eyes and tried to think of the words to say, any possible way to lessen this terrible news. Unable to think of anything, I decided to simply tell him everything. "Someone left pictures on my father's doorstep last night—surveillance pictures, of us. Us talking, on the street, in here, exchanging information—everything. We're exposed."
Vaughn looked as if I had punched him in the stomach—the color drained from his face, and his mouth hung open slightly. "Oh my God…this isn't happening," he whispered. I felt so sorry for him—I deserved all of this. I was the one double-crossing SD-6. But Vaughn—he was just a man who wanted to serve his country. He had friends, a mother, a bulldog—and I had shot that all to hell. He shouldn't be killed on account of me making the stupidest decision of my life when I was 19, and the most dangerous at 26.
"I…I…I don't know what to do," I responded helplessly, and suddenly wanted to cry. I just couldn't help it anymore—the lies, the secrecy, was simply too overwhelming. The tears I had held back earlier rushed to the surface of my eyes, threatening to expose my fragility. "I don't know how I'm going to get out of this—we! You, Vaughn—this isn't fair to you!" I cried, becoming desperate, and a tear spilled out onto my cheek.
"Syd, Syd, let's try to think rationally here," he pleaded, and I fought to drain the tears from my eyes. "Whoever it is, doesn't seem to have gone to SD-6…they must have some other motive." I nodded, forcing myself to concentrate on what he was saying. "If they did, we would be…" he stopped himself from finishing the sentence. We would be dead, I thought to myself bitterly. "We would know that they knew," he finished. I nodded. "The question is…who is it? Who took these pictures? Who wants us to know we've been made?"
After what seemed like an eternity of silence, I decided to speak. "Could it be another agency, looking to blackmail me for intel about SD-6?" He nodded, acknowledging this as a possibility. "It could be K- Directorate, Khisanau…could there be a mole in the Agency?" This last possibility scared me more than anything else—the CIA was the truth in what I was doing, my only safety. If I couldn't trust them…
"I don't know," he whispered, staring down at his hands. "It's a possibility…it would make sense."
"How would any other agency ever think of this, think to track me down…it just doesn't make sense." I felt defeated. It was the only possibility. "But, God…who could it be? What do we do?"
Vaughn sighed, and looked up at me. "If we report this to Devlin, tell him our suspicions—the mole would find out. That would be..."
He trailed off, and the true weight of the situation hit me like a brick wall. It hit me that we truly could be killed for this. I turned to him, my eyes full of fear, and finished his sentence. "…disastrous."
"Well, what are we supposed to do?" I spat out desperately, almost angrily. "Go on with our lives, pretend that we're not a step away from disaster? How do we do that? Aren't there any other options?"
"We flee," Vaughn replied simply, and I shook my head with determination. "We run, we get the hell out of here—and if we tell Devlin about this, we'll be forced into the Protection Program. He would never allow us to stay."
"I'm not hiding—I won't allow this person to take my life from me," I said with determination, and Vaughn nodded his head, almost hesitantly. "It seems as if this person, this agency, is looking for blackmail—I guess we wait and find out what they want?" I meant it to be a statement, but it came across as a question—because I had no idea what one did in a situation like this.
Vaughn looked up at me, into my eyes. "Sydney—whatever you do, whatever happens, we're in this together. And we will get through this together. I will not abandon you." I stared into his eyes, and saw that he was telling the truth—he would never leave me to get through this myself. After a minute, he spoke again. "I know this mission to Paris is the last thing on your mind—but it's an important one." I looked at him with curiosity. "The information you're being sent to retrieve—it's vital intel about the agency, about its inner workings. If—when," he corrected himself quickly, "we acquire this, it will be a crushing blow to SD-6." His eyes flashed with determination. "With this, Sydney—SD-6's end will actually be in sight."
My heart leapt—end. In sight. The words didn't even sound real. But this made up my mind. "It's settled, then," I said with conviction. "There's no way in hell I'm fleeing."