Title: House of Rambaldi
Author: CG
Feedback: Would love to hear what you have to say. If criticism, please
make it constructive.
Disclaimer: Alias is owned by ABC, Touchstone, and is the creation of JJ
Abrams and Bad Robot productions.
Spoilers: None that I know of.
Summary: A short bit of Sydney stuck in Rambaldi's house with a
certain someone on her tail.
Challenge: Your story must begin with this line... Much unhappiness has come
into this world because of things left unsaid. Story must be a vignette, (one
part) and must be between 1000-2500 words.
Your story should follow the thought of the above opening line. It should not
be spoken aloud by your character, but as a thought flowing from his/her mind
as you begin your story. There are a million different paths you could take
with this, thus my reason for using this prompt. It should not reference the
author of that line, Fyodor Dostoevsky. Treat it like it is your own, and let
the character go with it.
Ship: None, but contains Syd, Sark, and Rambaldi
Rating: PG-13 for language.
Distribution: Cover Me, Dark Enigma
Thanks to carmen_sandiego for the once over.
Much unhappiness has come into this world because of things left unsaid.
Unhappiness, sure, if these things left unsaid were as trivial as 'I'm sorry' or 'I love you' or 'don't go'. She agreed, since she had experienced so much of that in her life.
But the words needed to be tweaked a bit in order for her to completely compare them to her life. Adding something about 'imperative things purposely left unspoken in order to hide the truth of what was really transpiring brought about much unhappiness' would do the trick.
Actually, utter and total devastation summed it up better, Sydney shook her head as she hurriedly tallied the remaining bullets in her last clip – five – and silently pushed the magazine back in. Silent, but in the giant maze of hallways, the sound practically echoed.
She'd zigged here and zagged there, traveling what felt like a mile, and taking out innumerable interfering persons along the way, before stopping here to catch her breath. And yet the span of hallway in front of her just seemed to keep going and going and going…
It was endless, and absurd, just like the idea that in her life these things left unsaid brought about something as inconsequential as unhappiness.
Considering her entire life revolved around major things unspoken, Sydney Bristow might just be the authority on the destruction these things left in their wake. Not a day went by when someone didn't tiptoe around the full truth of the matter. Not a day went by when she didn't feel the ramifications of those secrets – for lack of a better word. And not a day went by when she didn't 'if only' herself about things skirted around in the past.
If only she'd declined the offer to join SD-6 and help "her country" without knowing in entirety what she was getting into.
If only she hadn't told Danny the awful truth about what she really did for the bank.
If only she'd kept Will safe in the beginning, even if it had taken more drastic measures.
If only she'd fought harder to get back to her life before deciding to lose two precious years and Michael Vaughn – who had moved on and married someone who was not her. Who, by his own strained admission, could never be her.
Okay, so that last one had nothing to do with the subject, but, damn it, it still hurt.
Sydney listened for a moment, her back firmly pressed up against the corridor's wall, knowing her oh-so-worthy adversary was only maybe a few hundred feet behind and getting closer with each breath she took. She couldn't hear him, but the anticipation tingling under her skin warned of his close proximity.
Five bullets, one assailant left. No tranq's. She would just have to make due. No, she would make do. Positive. After all, odds like those weren't so bad.
Usually.
"You'll never find your way out now," her latest obstruction whispered from the ground, still clutching the tranquilizer dart sticking out of his throat. His gaze slurred over her as insolently as his words.
If only she could find her way out of this horrendous mess of a house and end this nightmare.
Kicking the empty tranq gun, the piece tumbling end over end down the open hallway, consequently out of the man's reach – just in case – Sydney continued to move forward, optimistically looking for any sign of a safe exit.
There had to be one somewhere.
She was starting to get worried. After first exploring the second and what she thought the main floor of what was best described as a compound, she'd expected to be out in the fresh air and home free. Yet, even the front door she'd spied from outside earlier had seemed to move from where her sense of direction told her it was.
Strange, but in a this-is-Sydney-Bristow's-life kind of way, oddly predictable.
She was on the precipice of a Rambaldi sized meltdown; stuck in this place with no apparent end in sight. Which was fitting, considering that right now – this very minute – she was slinking through the rumored house of the man who, although dead for years upon years, always seemed to have control over at least a facet of her life.
And talk about things left unsaid. The man was the king of all these things.
Coordinates to a secret location found in a complex device. The fate of mankind in a vague prophecy. All obnoxiously ingenious, but equally annoying if the user interpreted the information incorrectly – which, nine out of ten times, they usually did.
Then there were those times that they didn't. Damn if destruction or the end of something critical didn't befall when the user actually got it right.
Those things the man had purposely left out of his works, making it that much more difficult for the user – that part she almost understood – were just as infuriating as this house he had built to his crazy Rambaldi standards.
All this effort, traipsing through three levels of this strange abode, even though the CIA had no confirmation that the man had left anything of importance here. More proof that the man and his works were the bane of her existence.
She rounded another corner, glancing over her shoulder as the previous hall disappeared, still seeing no sign of her attacker. The further she went ahead in what appeared to be same hallway after hallway, duplicated to infinity, the more she started to notice the small differences.
A missing light fixture over a bulb. The same picture repeated throughout the bottom level slightly tilted to one side in one hallway and then the other or just plain straight in another corridor. The different hours shown on the lone grandfather clocks in the otherwise clear hallway.
If it weren't for those variations, Sydney would have thought she'd been running in circles this entire time. And with whiling away a good hour already, just down in this lower level, that was a hell of a lot of circles.
Another corner led her to an identical hallway. This time instead of checking over her shoulder, Sydney decided to wait and see for herself that he was really still chasing her.
The old grandfather clock in the hall preceding where she stood chimed the time, intruding on the quiet stillness she'd worked so hard to keep in this lower level. The sound was intrusive and practically deafening after such a long bout of silence. Then the longer she stood, the more she actually began to hear.
Flattening her palms to her flushed cheeks, she listened as the old structure creaked and settled above her. A steady hum of energy, likely the electricity that kept the lower level lit, vibrated against her back through the wall and permeated the air. Given that the walls were so thick in this entire place, it was amazing she could hear any shifting or energy flow, but she could. And better to consider these as normal sounds of a structure rather than something more sinister.
Hesitantly, Sydney peered around the corner and heard the pop-whing-ping she'd been waiting for. Jerking her head back immediately, she sucked in a deep breath and watched the impending bullet slam maliciously into the wall in front of her.
Damn that towhead and his gun. She thrust her arm around the corner, letting off two shots, hoping beyond hope they would connect with something.
Two more shots answered her back, instantly dousing that burning flame of faith.
Well, at least he was close enough now so they could finally get their usual banter flowing between them. The kind they knew so well, that spoke volumes above words, and, bizarrely, left little unsaid between them.
She didn't even want to analyze what that meant.
So she didn't. But she only had three bullets left, so she'd have to keep her message short. Sticking her hand around the corner, she let one off.
Fuck off, Sark.
Pop. Pop.
Not on your life, Bristow.
Two more bullets were neatly embedded into the wall, tiny ripples of paint and plaster circling the entry point. That was surprising since she almost expected this old house to be bulletproof, too.
House? she scoffed. Mansion? Castle? More like insane asylum.
She ran down this new corridor, wondering if Sark was now doing the same down his. A mouse chasing his cheese, so to speak. Really, all that this place needed was a hall of mirrors and she'd deem it Rambaldi's Fun House.
Fun for the entire family. Right.
And shit.
Sydney hit another corner and skidded to a stop – the expected vacant hallway nowhere to be seen. What she saw made her gasp, unease unfurling like a waking cat in her stomach. She should have known, she thought, stepping forward and eyeing the hall's contents with her mouth agape. No, she had known. Looking in the first mirror and seeing countless more down the line, adorning both walls, she shuddered.
As if creepy couldn't get any creepier.
Each mirror had its own design; some were scrolled and beveled like gilded structures, while others were plain panes of glass. The first two were positioned in such a fashion that in the first mirror Sydney looked into her image seemed to be endless.
She knew that she needed to keep going, knew that Sark was right behind her, but this place was so awe worthy, so…disturbing. Plus, it was her first clue that she was indeed heading somewhere important.
Traveling down the line, she looked from mirror to mirror, seeing nothing but healthy reflections staring back at her. What did this mean? Where did Rambaldi want her to go?
Then she saw it – or rather didn't see it.
Near the end on the left hand side one mirror wasn't. Oh it looked like one, the artist painting the illusion of glass so perfectly she shivered, but it offered no reflection.
A mélange of emotions churning within, fear being the primary, Sydney pulled at the wooden frame. It moved easily, opening like a hidden door, and beyond that…
Another loud pop came from behind her, and the consequential whizzing sound that followed forced her through the entrance without looking.
The room she entered was set lower than the hallway, the step large enough that she jarred her ankle as she stumbled inside. A quick shot of pain lanced up her leg and she absently reached down to rub the area before remembering she had no time for such frivolities. Shaking the foot out instead, she scoured the room for an exit.
Looking behind her, she discovered those mirrors in the hall were two-ways. That alone gave her an edge. But an exit right along with it? Nope. Of course not, that would be too easy.
But wait.
To her right, in a darker corner and tantamount to the number forty-seven in lights, was the familiar Rambaldi symbol – made out of glass. She hobbled over to the mirror, as soundlessly as she could under the circumstances, checking for the latch to the circle shaped glass.
If this was the exit, then what her gut was telling her about Rambaldi's motivation for building this place really pissed her off.
Sydney leaned against a slab of wood situated next to glass for support, catching her breath, and saw the perfidious prince of secrets move down the hallway.
There was a fine tremor in her hands, but her aim didn't waver. Two bullets. To be safe, she needed this one to hit where it counted.
She waited until right before Sark reached the painting, knowing he'd be through it and closer to her in no time.
Three
Two
One
As her finger twitched on the trigger, she prayed that those mirrors weren't reinforced.
Sark flinched as the shot rang out in the air and immediately fired off his own in the direction he heard the noise coming from – right where she was standing. Her bullet crashed through glass, shattering it into thousands of shards, and he jumped to the side, leaving Sydney to wonder if she'd hit her target.
She'd sidestepped his shot, barely, the screaming bullet exploding through Rambaldi's circle next to her instead with a loud crash. Tiny bits of glass cut through her sleeve and into her skin, fierce, sharp stabs of pain accompanying the bites.
A breeze flowed into the room and she was drawn to the circle, seeing the gleam of metal in the form of a circular tube. A slide. What a perfect ending to the great man's idea of a joke. Her forced chuckle brought little salve to her chagrin.
Without haste, or question, Sydney dove inside the tube – head first – and let the slippery cylinder of metal take her out of there.
The drop was sharp, similar to the advanced waterslides she hardly remembered using as a youth, and it took her fast. She kept falling, and she had to force her arms to stay at her sides since gravity had different ideas.
Then finally, after what seemed like eternity, fresh air and water hit her stiff body and then she fell into depths unknown.
She landed flush on her back, on a combination of soft and hard and smooth and sharp – the force of her landing taking her breath away and sounding like an expelling bullet.
It was dark, and then she was thankful that she couldn't breathe since the blanket of unknown objects she'd landed on was fetid with odors that she had no time to or care in deciphering.
She should get up and go. Find the Ducati she'd ditched and head back to where she'd be safe for the night. And she would have just then if her ears hadn't registered something foreign.
Clunk. Bang. Thwap.
Those familiar sounds echoed in the night. He was close now. Rain continued to splatter on her prone body as she waited – eye squinting through the downpour, her aim steady on that hole – just waiting for Sark to slide out as she had moments before.
And praying that that sound she had heard as she'd landed wasn't her last bullet firing.
Then there it was. That swoosh. Even with darkness ensconcing her, she saw the darker shadow shoot out of the hole, arms and legs flailing, trying to regain control of his in flight situation.
Fat chance.
She wanted to squeeze off her last shot, end this, but her sight was too poor and his descent too fast to be accurate. Before her finger could even twitch on the trigger, he landed squarely on top of her with a loud oomph.
Click. Click.
The two empty discharges, each from a separate weapon, sounded simultaneously. Damn, wouldn't it figure? Empty.
"Well, doesn't that just… stink," Sark concluded for them both on a ragged breath.
Boy did it. And Sydney hadn't even begun to digest the rancid scent of spoiled milk and generously molded food coating the inside of her nose. Yet.
"Yeah," Sydney hesitantly agreed, her stomach lurching once and then again as the putrid smell invaded her throat and lungs.
Jesus, it tasted worse than it smelled. She swallowed the burn of rising bile and forced herself to breathe – in through her mouth and right back out the same way. Better that than to keep smelling and tasting the stench and then having to vomit up whatever, if anything, was in her stomach. There was no way in hell she was going to lose it in front of Sark of all people.
Sydney let her gun trail down her fingertips and then further, then used that hand to fist a chunk of Sark's shirt. Raising her knee, she slid it up between them to his stomach and kicked her leg out, letting go of the wad of material in her hand as she propelled him up and over her head.
She stood and automatically prepared herself for his retaliation. Her legs braced in the uneven terrain of garbage and dirt, hands held up in front of her for balance and easy blocking, she saw him jackknife into a sitting position about a hundred feet away.
In a heartbeat, he eyed their surroundings, confusion and a hint of disgust banked in the depths of his eyes. She knew the feeling. Sure, they were outside now, but just how long was that chute and in which direction had it sent them.
Sark glanced up at the night sky, his eyes crinkling as streams of raindrops continuously pelted and ran down his face. Then he looked back at her, seeing her crouched in a fighting position, and barked out a short laugh.
"I didn't think I'd ever escape that fucked up house," he mused aloud.
"Mad house," Sydney corrected absently, and Sark tilted his head curiously to the side.
"Never mind," she mumbled with a wave of her hand.
They both looked around the dump, close to a ten foot deep hole in the ground containing what seemed like a small city's worth of trash, before returning their gazes to each other.
"There was nothing in there, was there?" Sark asked, apparently knowing the answer as well as she did.
Sydney shook her head, embarrassed, and turned away, hoping to find a way out.
Moments later, she encountered the edge of the pit; dirt that was steadily turning into mud the more it rained lining the sides. She looked up and then back down, wondering how many of these filled garbage bags she would need to stack in order to reach the top.
Her thoughts stopped as she saw Sark out of the corner of her eye, climbing up what from a distance looked like a ladder. Leave it to him to find the easy way out before her and compound her ire. She moved to stand below him, watching as his muscles bunched and rippled under his soaked black turtleneck while he climbed.
Giving him a bit of distance, merely precautionary on her part, Sydney soon followed. Slowly.
She ascended the rickety ladder a good minute behind Sark, but she found him still waiting when she reached the top. A predatory gleam lit his eyes in the instant they were both rooted on solid ground again, him standing mere feet away, the unasked question shining through.
Fight?
Good question. Then again, what would be the point? No weapons, no artifact that needed acquiring, no one close enough to assist her when she kicked his ass. She shook her head and he shrugged, seeming to understand.
"So… uh," Sark jutted his thumb in one direction.
Sydney turned and looked in the other and replied, "Yeah."
They parted with another key thing left unspoken between them.
Until next time.
Let more 'unhappiness' ensue, Sydney shook her head as she walked away, cursing the entire concept of secrets and things left unsaid.