A/N : Hi everyone! First of all, I want to thank everyone who reviewed the previous chapter. It really meant the world to me. Now, I told some of you that I'd dreamt of the story and that I was going to continue it : sooo here's the next chapter. If you would like it better if I just left the previous chapter at a one-shot and start this story some other place (I could call it Worth the fall II or something) then you can tell me! I really hope you like it. As I already hinted in the previous chapter : it deals with the spoiler about "Michael having to chose between saving Lincoln's life and saving Sara's". This chapter is sort of an 'in-between' chapter, to get it going.

Please tell me if you like it? Please?

XO, as always


Michael

She sat in front of him at the small table in the deserted café, poised and collected. A whole different person than the mother he remembered, she was not. Sure, she had aged over time, grown older with vicious wrinkles on her skin, but she wasn't all that different from the woman who had once read him bedtime stories and built birdhouses. Physically, that is.

She wasn't his mother anymore on a whole different level. The one where she had tried to kill his brother and was a dangerous opponent in this game they were playing. She could take from him what the General had tried to all along : his life, his future and all the things he loved most.

"Mother."

Her voice was soft as she returned his greeting, seemingly showing regret and begging for compassion. But he knew all too well about lies and deceit and even before coming here, he had sworn to himself not to fall for any of her games. You just couldn't try to take out your sons and then ask for their forgiveness. You just couldn't.

"We need to talk, Michael. It's not what you think. There's something else playing here, you couldn't imagine all the - "

"Right." He nodded, drawing her out, "You know what I couldn't imagine? A mother trying to end her sons' lives because she wants power to rule the world. Is that what you're "bargaining" for? Our lives for your fortune?"

She shook her head with a small sigh. "I don't want to hurt you, Michael. And I don't want to hurt your brother. But if you keep on trying to undermine this operation that I am trying to set up, then I have no choice. I have to do what needs to be done." She met his fierce gaze with her own, not backing down. "I just wish you would understand."

"I don't. I'm sorry, I just can't." He really couldn't. To him, it was just inconceivable that his own mother would give the command to kill her son. Especially now that he was about to become a parent himself.

Flashback

Sara hadn't left his arms again that night, nor the nights after that. She woke from time to time, and he could tell that when she did, she was restless, but she just pulled his arm a little tighter around her and sighed. He had always responded by pressing a small kiss just behind her left ear and pulling her close.

Once the shock of her pregnancy had worn off, he was overcome with the emotions that he rationally knew were the most appropriate in this situation, and felt in his heart. He felt love, he felt happiness, yet he was scared to death. Sara was still in harm's way as long as he would be and now that they had another opponent, the ammount of danger had doubled. He mostly went on his missions alone. He couldn't risk losing her or the baby.

And anyway, it felt great coming home to her.

Present day

"You know that Lincoln and I were figuring out a way out of this that doesn't involve hurting you? We were trying to bend and swerve around every possible situation that would end up with you gone. And you just order for a sharp shooter to take him out." Michael stood up, letting the chair screech on the black and white tiles that lay in the room, where every sound just seemed to echo. "We're done trying to find a way."

"Michael." She lay her hand on his arm trying to stop him from leaving, and feigned hurt when he shook it off. "I'm your mother, Michael."

"You just stay away from me, and stay away from my family, Mother." He spat out the term. "Because if you do anything to hurt them, I will bring you down in the worst possible way. As for Scylla - - at the final show down, I will be there to stop you."

This time she let him leave, but he felt her eyes bore into his back when he walked away. It was more than that, he could literally feel her goons reaching for their guns and looking at her for an order to shoot. He didn't even feel victorious when he walked out unharmed.

Sara

The first thing she noticed when he came in was how tired he looked. It was the sort of air that only came from being worn out emotionally, no matter how much sleep you'd had at night.

"Smells great in here." He told her, walking over to where she was standing by the stove, stirring a pot of pasta sauce. Wrapping his arms around her from behind, he let his head fall onto her shoulder and closed his eyes. Almost immediately he felt her hand touch the side of his face, tenderly stroking his cheek.

"How was it?"

He sighed. "One thing is for sure : that woman was not the mom I knew. She was so fake, Sara. So utterly formed by her need of power, her desire to reign over the Company, that I just couldn't recognize her anymore. She basically said that she would kill us both if we stood in her way."

Letting go of her, he opened the cabinet on the other side of the room and started to set the table. "Going on and on about her operation, about how it wasn't what I thought it to be,… I just..God," he touched his fingers to his forehead and squeezed the skin together. "now I know why I was so good at lying."

"You weren't that good." Sara playfully said, hoping to lighten the mood. "I could always see right through you."

He gave her a feeble smile. "I'm serious. She tried to convince me that she regretted it all, a straight face – puppy eyed expression and a soft voice. I didn't fall for it."

"Well," she smiled and kissed the palm of his hand before threading their fingers together. "I remember Fox River, Michael. And I knew you meant it when you were apologizing to me. So you're not as bad as she is. You had to lie to me, God knows what I would have done if you hadn't. But in the end you came through for me." Sara ran a hand over his short cropped hair. "And that was proof enough that you cared."

"I cared." He whispered, softly capturing her lips in a sweet kiss. "I really did."

Michael

It was nearly nightfall when the phone rang. Michael rinsed his mouth from brushing his teeth and walked over to his cellphone, that lay discarded on the couch, not needed after the aweful meeting this afternoon. But now it rang and as he went to get it, he wondered what was so important that needed to be resolved right now.

"Michael?"

Great. Another call from 'the other side'. He only hoped that it wasn't to talk him out of his own quest and join their camp to return Scylla to the General, so 'all would be well'. Except the whole world would fall to bits, that is.

"Alex. What can I do for you?"

"They've got your brother, Michael. They took Linc."


So? (bites lip nervously) What did you think? Please tell me? Please?

Xo, as always