Picking up her glass of wine, Sydney reached over to turn off the light. She spotted her mother's book lying where she had laid it earlier. She had looked through that novel so much lately that she thought she would never look at it again. Suddenly, she wanted to read it. To actually read it, to be lost in the story instead of worrying about motifs.
Grinning, she picked it up and headed for the bedroom. She lit a candle and settled into bed. Leaning back against the pillows, she began to read, letting the story carry her away to a different time and place.
She was several pages into the story when she noticed the writing in the margins. She held it up to the lamp, but she couldn't make out the dim markings. She picked up the candle and held it beneath the page.
Her heart stopped. She recognized the code. One-time pads. Blocks of cipher-text written in sets of five Cyrillic letters. A staple of the now-defunct KGB. Tossing the book away from her, she started trembling. It was impossible. She wouldn't believe it.
Tears sprang to her eyes as she thought about what Laura had said during their shopping. She had not appreciated him at first. Now, thinking about the code in those books, Sydney had to wonder if her mom had been totally honest. She wasn't regretting not appreciating him enough; she had honestly not appreciated him at all.
No, no, no, no, no. She had to be wrong. There had to be some other explanation. Only Sydney couldn't think of one. These books had arrived every month for the first ten years of their marriage. Laura had told her about their honeymoon, about the incredible book store in Prague. Sydney had found it romantic, and she had hated to hear that Laura had insisted that Jack stop paying for them after ten years. "We had medical bills that needed to be paid more, and your father fought me all the way on that decision, but I won," Laura had told her with a smile. The standing order had been cancelled.
Now, Sydney thought about that standing order and the timing. She thought about Calder and his order to kill a rogue agent. She thought abut the fact that her mother had never needed to disappear for any training when she joined SD-6.
Curling up into a ball, Sydney resisted the urge to scream. She wouldn't be able to explain it to Francie. Instead she cried and held a pillow over her head, as if it could block out all the thoughts that were now trying to overwhelm her.
***
"Did Sydney seem okay to you?" Jack asked as he stepped into Vaughn's office.
Jack saw the tension and the flash of anger on Vaughn's face. He had been upset to find out the man he had trusted for the last two decades had lied to him at the beginning. "She seemed a little stressed, a little pale, but otherwise okay," Vaughn answered mechanically.
"Something is bothering her," Jack said as he paced. "But she wouldn't tell me. She said it was the test she had been given by Dryer, but I know she was lying."
"A Bristow family trait," Vaughn said. Then, he winced. "Jack, I'm sorry."
Jack stared at him. That cut had gone deep; it was a family trait. "I understand."
Vaughn rubbed his neck as he sighed, "I just wish you had told me. Sometime in the last twenty or so years."
Jack agreed. "I should have. I'm sorry, Michael."
"Why didn't you?" Vaughn stared at him, waiting for an answer.
The smile on Jack's face was weak. "I wish I knew, Michael. Maybe I didn't want you to know that there was enough evidence to suggest your father was involved in something underhanded. Maybe I didn't want you to know that I was fallible."
Vaughn sighed. "Why was there so much evidence?"
Jack hated hearing the doubt in that voice. "If I had to guess, he was being framed to take the fall."
"What?" Vaughn's jaw was open.
"I think someone was framing your father, but I don't know why. Or why we suddenly found the evidence clearing him." Jack stood and prepared to leave. "Call me when Sydney gets from Argentina, please."
"Jack, she'll be okay. I gave her a CIA satellite phone."
Satellite phones for doubles were not standard issue. "Why did you do that?"
"I don't know," Vaughn admitted, looking down at his hands. "I just thought she might need it."
"You'd better watch it," Jack said with a small smile on his face. "Or I'm going to think that I'm talking to your Aunt Trish."
"Oh, please," Vaughn said. "Don't even get me started. I'm still trying to figure out this clock Rambaldi had made and how the hell he used it and that polymer sun that Sydney recovered to make a star chart."
"Or how he got to the southern slop of Mount Aconcagua XXX on the Chile/Argentina border on August 16, 1523 at 12:22 AM GMT in the first place." Jack and his colleagues had been having a field trying to figure out those answers.
"And drew an exact star chart," Vaughn replied. He rubbed his forehead. "I'm getting a headache, Jack."
Jack knew the feeling. "How's Alice?" he asked, changing the subject.
Vaughn froze for a second. Then, he smiled, but Jack knew it was fake. "Good; hinting for a ring."
"You're not ready for marriage," Jack said before he thought. He knew that Vaughn's feelings for Alice had continued to decline.
Vaughn looked at him and then shook his head. "I know."
"She would have made you a good wife," Jack told him. She would have, too, before Vaughn met Sydney and started yearning for something else, something besides the safe path that he had always taken.
"Sydney's not sure what the test results are yet, but she declined my offer of protection," Vaughn told him suddenly.
Jack's heart ached. "I know. She's too much like her father; he would rather be free to fight then hide like a frightened animal."
Vaughn's smile was weak but real. "That's what I was thinking."
Jack wanted to warn him again to not fall in love with Sydney, to take the easier path. But he knew it wouldn't do any good. Vaughn was determined to follow his own path in life. And his own heart. He was too much like Jack in that way.
***
Sydney sat down after she entered Sloane's office. She had been in Marshall's office for a tech briefing when he arrived saying that he needed to talk to her. Her heart pounded in her chest, but she didn't let him see her sweat.
"I should start with your test results," Sloane said as he sat down at is desk. Sydney couldn't breathe as she waited for him to continue. "You passed just fine. The numbers were normal."
Sydney wasn't sure how to respond. She knew she shouldn't grin and shout--her first reaction. Instead, she said, "I'd hope so."
"I know what a difficult time this is," he said, trying to sound like the caring man he was not. "I understand, with Dixon in the hospital--"
"Have you heard anything?" Sydney demanded to know. Dixon had been shot in Argentina by K-Directorate. Sydney herself had almost died after being knocked from the top of a tall ladder. By some miracle that no one could explain, Sydney's leg had caught on one of the rings of the rope ladder, stopping her fall. She should have at least been seriously hurt; instead she only had some sore muscles.
Now, she had to wait and see if Dixon remembered her using the CIA sat phone. He had said her call name twice after she used it. Sloane had been told that Sydney had dragged Dixon back to the Humvee, and that she had drove him to the hospital. However, Dixon might be able to tell him that he had been flown there by helicopter.
"Yes," Sloane answered. "He's still unconscious. They're not sure how bad it is. Look, Sydney," he said, leaning against his desk. "I don't blame you for not talking to me the way you used to, for hating me, since what happened with Danny. Please believe me when I tell you it was the last thing I wanted. The last thing. I begged security section not to take that action."
Sydney's heart stopped. Then it began to beat again with rage. She knew he was lying; she knew it. He had never liked Danny. It was the reason she pulled off her engagement ring the minute she had stepped inside the building the day after Danny proposed; she knew he would not be happy for her.
"No, you didn't," Sydney said, ignoring the voice that sounded like her father telling her to be careful.
Sloane did not look surprised. "Well, you don't have to believe me."
"Why would you try and stop what you had ordered?" she demanded. She would not pretend that he was not responsible; she would not pretend that she not hate him for what he had done to Danny.
"Because of you," he told her. "I always knew there was something about you, from the first time I saw you."
Sydney felt like throwing up. "A lot can change in seven years."
"It's been a lot longer than seven years," he admitted. She couldn't hide her surprise. "I met your father in 1971. Because of the sensitive nature of his job at Jennings' Aerospace, he was subjected to security reviews. He knew a lot of agents."
"Which is why I could never say your name around him," Sydney realized.
"Yes, it is. He would know my name instantly. We liked one another. We were friends, Sydney. Jack would recognize my name immediately." Sydney listened, wanting to know the history he shared with her father. Jack would never tell her. "I was even invited to his wedding to your mother."
"That's where you met her," Sydney said.
"Not exactly. I had met her before the wedding. Had dinner with them and so forth," Sloane told her. "I liked her; I thought she was good for your father."
"You're the one who recruited her," Sydney said, trying to make it sound like a question.
Sloane nodded. "Yes, I saw her potential. I knew she would be an excellent resource for SD-6."
He leaned forward and smiled. "I've known you, Sydney, since you were a baby. I was out of the country for most of your childhood, various operations, but I kept tabs on you." Sydney felt a shiver of dread climb her spine. He had been watching her for most of her life. Would she ever be able to escape from him?
"I checked in on you in my own way," he continued. "I always thought of you as my daughter, even from the beginning. Well, I just wanted to let you know . . . before you went away."
***
"It was like he was saying goodbye," Sydney told Vaughn later.
"Like he knew that I'm not coming back."
"You're going to be okay. We'll get through this. Just contact me as soon as you get back," her handler told her. He was sitting behind her at an outdoor café.
"I know. With his account numbers," Sydney said.
"No, I mean, with or without the account. Just as soon as you get back."
Sydney could hear the concern in his words. He had his doubts, too. Sloane's behavior had been odd. "Okay," she told him.
"Okay?"
"Okay." This time it was a promise.
***
Weiss rushed over to him. Vaughn noted the sheet of paper in his hand, but he was more concerned by the worried look on his friend's face. Weiss did not take much seriously in life.
"Agent Bristow has been made," he said. "We just unlocked this communiqué off of the SD-6 server."
Vaughn grabbed the printout from his hands. "What?"
"Ten p.m., Dinatti Park. They're going to kill her." Vaughn saw the compassion in his eyes. His friend knew that his feelings for Sydney were not what they should be. "SD-6 is going to kill her. We have to tell Davenport, but he's not in his office."
Vaughn picked up the phone, dialing a number from memory. He always made sure to have the certain numbers memorized when Sydney went on a mission. He wanted to be able to respond instantly. "Yes, it's Vaughn. We need an extraction team assembled in Italy. No, Tuscany. We only have two hours!"
He started heading for the elevator. "I'll go tell Davenport!" Devlin was in DC at Langley.
"I just told you: he's not in his office!" Weiss reminded him.
"I'm going to go find him," Vaughn said over his shoulder. "Get Jack on the phone!"
"Jack? Got ya," Weiss said. Vaughn saw him on the phone as he headed out of the room.
***
"Jack," Vaughn said as soon as his friend stormed into the room.
"Call them off, Michael," Jack snapped. "Now."
Vaughn felt like he had fallen down the rabbit hole. "What? Didn't you read Sloane's transmission? She'll be in that park any minute, Jack."
"No execution has been ordered. This is a set-up, Michael. I know it," Jack explained. Vaughn could see the strain on the older man's face.
"What are you talking about?"
Jack sighed and unbuttoned his jacket. "Michael, this is what I do. Game strategy. My first instinct was to pull her out, too, but I know Arvin Sloane. Know him very well."
Walking over to Vaughn, he explained. "I'm willing to bet that SD-6 has spotted your computer hacking. I'm also willing to bet that they are using it as a test, to see if Sydney is a mole."
Vaughn shook his head. "Jack, that's an awful large bet. Let's pull Sydney out of there and figure out strategy later."
"Michael," Jack said through gritted teeth. "You go in like this, you pull her out, it'll only prove that you've intercepted Sloane's communiqué, and Sydney will be exposed."
"You don't know that for a fact!"
Jack stared at him for a minute. Vaughn was shocked by what he did next; he turned to Davenport. "Lloyd, abort this mission."
"Wait a minute!" Vaughn could not believe Jack had gone over his head, had ignored his concerns.
"We verified this order, Jack," Davenport was telling him. "We pull back, you could be killing your daughter."
"You're killing her if you don't!" Jack growled.
Vaughn felt doubt. He had always trusted Jack's instincts before. Maybe he should trust them now. "Why are you willing to risk this, Jack?"
Jack looked at him. He leaned forward as he explained, "If Sydney makes her scheduled dead-drop, does it successfully, and leaves the park, she will have proven herself loyal to SD-6."
"Have them hold 'til we give the order," Vaughn told Weiss. His friend nodded and gave the order.
Vaughn stared back at the man who had taught him everything I know. "There is a man in that park that could kill her if we do nothing."
Jack shook his head, and Vaughn could see Jack's certainty. "You are the only ones who saw the transmission, Michael. I know Sloane. He's bluffing."
"How can you be sure?"
"Because this is about betrayal. Arvin Sloane has an odd definition of betrayal. It's the reason he left the CIA. He takes it very personally, and he would never, ever, let someone else take care of that kind of problem." Jack stared at him. "Trust me."
When Vaughn heard the team tell him that two vehicles not on their list were in the park, he resisted the urge to tell them to protect Sydney. When they announced a man in a red jacket heading towards her, he clenched his fist and reminded himself that Jack was an expert on strategy. "This could be our guy,"
Weiss told him. "This could be the hit. What are we doing here?"
Vaughn looked over at Jack. "Jack, promise me you're not wrong about this!" Jack nodded, and Vaughn let out the breath he had been holding. "Hold your position," Vaughn said.
He heard the entire room sigh and breathe again when the man in the red jacket passed by her. She made her dead drop and left the park. Davenport smiled at Jack. "Good work, Jack."
Jack nodded, and Vaughn saw the doubt for the first time. They both stared at one another, and Vaughn finally understood the cost his friend had just paid. His instincts as a father had been to pull her out, but he had fought against them--and Vaughn--because of his training. This would be his future if he let himself care too much about Sydney. Jack nodded again and left the room.
"Oy. I just lost thirty pounds," Weiss announced to the room, trying to relieve some of the tension. "I'm not kidding." Vaughn realized that he had just lost his innocence; he had learned what this job was going to cost him.