True North: Compass Points _

Disclaimer: These characters are the property of J.J. Abrams, who is most likely cringing as I type.

A/N: Part one of more than one. If the title bears a striking similarity to Fisher's "True North", it's because I, um, appropriated it for my own uses. This story is a big honkin' AU, written mostly because finals are over and because I missed my fix last week. I'm going to blame my semester grades on ABC.

***

"We intercepted a message from K-Directorate agents yesterday detailing an intended heist tomorrow evening in Massachusetts. The Veris compass was developed by Anderson Technologies, and J.M. Anderson is holding a celebratory party tomorrow night at his estate in Boston. Sydney and Dixon will go. Any questions?" Sloane looked levelly around the table.

"What are they going to do with a compass?" asked Sydney absently, looking at the debriefing screen.

"Not just any compass," Sloane chided. "Marshall?"

Marshall's head snapped up and he got to his feet awkwardly. "As we all know, you can seriously screw a compass up by putting a magnet about it. From what I've heard, you can't mess up this compass. The mechanism is supposed to be the most accurate in the world, which is such a major scientific breakthrough and hey, what a far cry from getting the directions from the stars, right? I mean, not that we can see the stars these days anyway, but. Um." He withered slightly under Sloane's steely gaze. "Anyway. It always goes back to true north, no matter the magnet, situation, altitude, environment...okay. So. Yeah."

"Bombs," said Jack Bristow, cutting through the extended silence. "Torpedoes, nuclear warheads---the mechanism on this compass could be manipulated as a surefire targeting assist. If it can keep a hold on true north, it could be an extremely valuable guard against coordinate errors."

Sloane nodded, eyes gleaming. "With the state the world is in, we can't afford to let K-Directorate get their hands on this."

A murmur of agreement went up in the room, a surge of patriotism running through the agents like electricity. Sydney met her father's eyes across the table and held them.

***

She waited impatiently at the red light, tapping her fingers on the steering wheel and letting her mind wander to the "Joey's Pizza" call she'd known was coming. Barring Danny, this was the steadiest relationship she'd ever had.

The thought was sudden and unwanted, and something like absolutely moronic, because even mentioning him in the same mental breath as Danny meant that he was occupying a slightly more-than-platonic berth in her mind. Obviously, this was a bad thing, leading to national security breaches and heartbreak and lack of efficiency and heartbreak, and another dead body in a bathtub, and okay, that was a big old bunch of heartbreak just waiting to happen. She had a brief panic attack until the sweet-looking grandmother behind her gunned her engine threateningly.

Right. Green meant go.

She wasn't sure when she'd gotten so paranoid about relationships, but she had a feeling it had something to do with bathtubs. More importantly, she wasn't sure when she had started seeing her handler as a potential love interest. It wasn't any kind of hero-worship or overblown admiration, because in all honesty she could probably take him in a one-on-one. He was nice-looking but not aggressively so, and he was as caring and concerned as all her friends were, but the one quality that stood him apart from everyone else was the fact that he understood. Nothing helped the bonding process like finding out your mom killed his dad.

Which was a relief, more or less, because it meant that this strange attraction was based purely on the fact that he was pretty much the only eligible man in her life who understood the pressure of her job. It was also insanely depressing, seeing as he was the only eligible man in her life who knew about her job at all.

The phone rang, and she maneuvered expertly into a parking space as she picked up with her free hand. "Hello?"

"---no, I wanted that in the other pile---what do you mean the copy's not there?" There was rustling in the background and a muffled obscenity. "Oh---hey, Syd. This is Will, but, um, you probably already guessed that. Because---yeah, well, anyway. This is Will."

She resisted the urge to laugh and settled for a wide grin instead. "I figured."

She could just picture him, nodding enthusiastically and pacing around his office. "Right, right. Anyway. I wanted to know if you were free tonight, because I bought some really nice wine and the entire Star Wars trilogy." There was a pause. "Oh my God, I can't believe I said that. I just hit the bottom. I can get no lamer."

"Oh, Will," she said, because she always hated doing this. "I can't. I'm sorry. I have an emergency meeting at work tonight, and I really can't get away because it's---"

"Super-important," he finished for her. "No, it's no problem, really. It was short notice anyway. Listen, the offer still stands. If you want to drop by after your meeting, you might be able to catch my incredible lightsaber moves."

"Which is enough to keep me far, far away," she laughed. "No, I'm kidding. I'll keep it in mind."

"That's good enough for me," he said softly. "I'll talk to you later."

"Bye." She sat in the darkness for a few seconds after she clicked her phone off, and something was hurting in the vicinity of her heart. It would have been nice to be able to love Will. Francie was of the mind that the boy was madly in love with her, complete with irrational jealousy. This was a theory she had vehemently denied until that awful kiss---and the fact that there was actually a sober second kiss---that left her feeling embarrassed for him. But he was still there, and she didn't know if the fact that he was still trying was supremely stupid or incredibly touching.

Remembered something about a cold night and warm arms, and decided that for what it was worth, he was a good friend.

She got out of the car feeling like she had just delivered one of her roundhouse kicks to a puppy, and the sight of Vaughn with a welcoming smile perked her up less than it usually did. She nodded a perfunctory greeting and hoisted herself up on the table. "So what's the countermission?" she asked brusquely. "And I've seen the pictures of this thing. I seriously can't tell it apart from a boy scout compass."

He looked a little taken aback at her abruptness, but carried on in the same vein gamely. "That's right. Nobody's ever seen the interior of the Veris compass, so we'll be performing a switch. Here," he produced a similar-looking compass, "is an exact replica of the compass from the outside. We'll have an agent hand it off on your way out." He saw her grimace and remembered a switch-off gone wrong, and shook his head reassuringly. "Nothing to blow up this time."

Sydney shook her head. "The fact that you're going to have someone there at all. K-Directorate's probably going to send Anna, and if she or anyone else sees the switch it could be all over."

"Sydney," he said, and his voice was quiet and toneless. "Don't worry about it. It's a greater risk for you to take both. Like you said, it's extremely difficult to tell it apart from any standard compass."

She was about to argue but looked at him, and he was tired and thin-looking recently, and she snapped her mouth shut. "You're right. I'm sorry I was snippy," she said contritely, drawing her knees up to her chin. "I mean. You're a really great guy and all, and I'm incredibly lucky to have you as my handler, but I guess. I just get tired of having to make up excuses, even if it's only to keep him safe, you know?"

He nodded sympathetically, looking nobly restrained but like he was hurting inside, and the thing with him was that it was all genuine. She saw the question in his eyes and remembered he didn't know about Will. "My journalist, um, friend," she amended lamely. "It's just that I can't tell him what's going on, and that's so confining. I feel horrible about it. It's like there's this huge damper over us, because if I say anything wrong it could mean so much more."

She paused momentarily to wonder when she had degenerated into a Will-like babbler, but he was nodding again, his eyes focused on a spot behind her head. "I wasn't going to tell you this, but our psychiatrist wanted me off as your handler, especially because of the...the thing with your mother, and my dad."

This made it seem like more of an illicit affair, and she wasn't sure it sounded any better. "She killed him, Vaughn," she pointed out, voice thick. "It's a pretty big deal."

He offered her a half-smile. "Well, yes, but it's over and done with and we can't change the past. The thing is, she thinks I'm too emotionally attached to you to function well as your handler." This sounded like every argument she'd made in her mind on the way over, but she glanced at him and he didn't seem too worried about it and actually looked vaguely amused. Intellectual and collected. Mature, maybe.

"Are you?" She asked lightly, her voice dropping in a way she didn't like.

He looked at her, his face completely serious now, and when he spoke his voice sounded strangely unsteady. "Probably."

***

It was one-thirty when she let herself in with the key under his flowerpot, and the dark room was illumined by the dim glow of the television. Will was draped awkwardly over the couch, an ancient quilt more on the floor than on him, his glasses still on and his hair a messy golden halo around his head. There were a few stray pretzels and beer cans scattered on the floor, and the scene was so pathetic it was painful.

Most likely she was the inadvertent cause of some of this. Will had probably been a lot more well-adjusted before he met her.

He mumbled something in his sleep and shifted restlessly, and she froze, waiting until his breathing became deep and regular before turning off the television. He looked tense when he slept, forehead slightly furrowed and his mouth drawn, a sharp contrast to the little-boy smile he usually wore. She rescued his quilt and tucked it around him, inexplicably gratified when he relaxed some. She had never thought about Will worrying about something enough to carry it into sleep, before.

She tried smoothing out the faint lines of his forehead, slightly shaken, and before she left she dropped a quick light kiss where her hand had been.

***

_02022002 (jen@velvet-star.com)