: absolute zero :

by: hillary (aliasfanfiction@hotmail.com) / http://sop.diary-x.com/

rated: R (at ff.net) –this is a HARD R… please do not read unless you are of suitable age and maturity – language. violence. adult situations

classification: post-rambaldi destruction story.

genre: angst. angst…oh, it's a big ol' sea of endless angst

spoilers: all through season one INCLUDING "Almost 30 Years"

disclaimer: Hi JJ. I'd love to be a part of the ALIAS staff so that I uh, could CLAIM an itty bit of ownership. Since we both know that's impossible…I'm poor and own nothing.

distribution: CM, most assuredly. All else, please ask

note: additional notes at end. feedback always appreciated, negative or positive, please be sure to tell me what you thought.

Absolute Zero : one: take to the sky

: Nevada: outside of Carson City; Labor Day - September, 2004:

Sydney Bristow looks at herself in the mirror, face blanched white and small in the glass, water splotches marring her reflection behind the smeared surface.

Thirty is an unkind year.  She knew it would be, all along, but refuses to think about it; instead focusing on the obvious facts that piled up around her and made themselves increasingly evident, more and more difficult for her to fully comprehend. Difficult used to be her forte; now it made her feel old. Old and she is only thirty. Only thirty, but it feels like she's been going a million years. The lines around her eyes, spiraling outwards –although still nearly miniscule - give silent testimony to the validity of this fact.

Three hours ago she'd sat in a barber's chair, instructed the woman behind it with bright red hair and burgundy lipstick to cut off every inch of her mid-length chestnut hair. And color, she requested color; lots of it. She'd wanted to leave the salon looking like a different person, unable to recognize herself when she got out of that chair. Peering at the face that stares back at her she finds that the stylist has been successful in obeying her requests, her hair now a million lengths, twiggy ends sticking out around her face. And red: honey gold swirls meet copper in the dull florescent light.

Outside the bathroom door, the gentle knocking of another person distracts her from the contemplation of age and haircuts.

"Miss? Miss? Are you almost done in there?"

Almost done. Strange to think that in another twelve hours this will not even bother her anymore.

*

:Las Vegas:

Seven pm and the strip is swarming with vacationers. Heat swells off the pavement even after sunset, making the night irradiated with desert warmth. She walks with purpose, long black dress sliding rhythmically against her thighs.

The Monte Carlo is her destination, blackjack table four, where a man sits and drinks a bourbon and water, his expression one of mild disinterest.

"You made it." he says with a kindness that doesn't reach his eyes. Cold fingers find her collarbone, tracing an imaginary angle. His fingers, the haunting presence of an all-too familiar ghost, makes her repress an urge to close her eyes and shudder from the aching misery his touch brings. Familiar, and yet incessantly damning, she remains stock still from the contact, afraid to move from his hand but more troubled when she feels the slow wash of warmth his presence always seems to bring her.

"I love it when you wear pearls," his voice is low, deceptively soft, but sharp along the edges that only she can hear. His eyes silently survey her attire, the long, shape-hugging dress, her hair curling around her face. Index finger still on the necklace, right beneath her throbbing pulse, he offers a cool smile before pulling his hand away from the opaque beads to grab his glass. Throwing back the tumbler and swallowing, his Adams apple jutting up and down erratically, he wordlessly offers her his chair.

"My wife." He announces to the dealer. Sydney bristles from the casual nature of his tone in association to the title; the flat, emotionless declaration swallowed in the surrounding din. Unseeing, Sydney declines his offer to be seated and instead focuses momentarily on the uninterested dealer behind the table, the woman's grey-green eyes flashing with self-contained boredom as she shuffles the deck in her hands.

"Darling, I much prefer Roulette. You know that." The plaintive note Sydney's voice is fabricated, almost pitched, as well as the accompanying pout on her lips. She places her hand on his shoulder, feeling the fabric of his shirt beneath her fingers as well as the tensing of his muscles. They meet eyes and hold the gaze.

"Roulette is a very risky game, Julia." He pronounces the name beautifully, making it sound exotic, less plain.

"David." She purrs, bringing her mouth close to his ear, her lips nearly touching the tip of his lobe. "Everything is set" she murmurs, and then pulls away. "I like to take risks."

Sydney's eyes fall on the dealer, the casino employees eyes suddenly riveted to the couple before her, no doubt entranced by his hand on her bare back, the way she slides into his space and begs for his compliance. Fiddling with the cards in her hands, she watches them with unconcealed interest. To Sydney's desensitized eyes the girl is plain; dishwater blonde hair falling against her shoulders. The woman probably finds them some form of occupational entertainment, one of the small highlights of her hour at table four.

"Sir, would you like to play another hand?" She enquires with a thin and reedy voice, albeit polite. It makes Sydney draw away from his warmth and re-fix her eyes on an elderly woman pumping nickels into a slot machine, her face devoid of emotion as she plops in one coin after another in a sort of fitful, mindless trance.

Beyond them there is the noise of the casino, raised voices laughing, pings of coins in the metal trays and the occasional squeal of a lucky winner. Slot machines jangle harmoniously around them, met with the low undercurrent of ice against glass as patrons gulp down beverages.

A waitress appears, asks if he would like another Bourbon. He shakes his head.

"Miss?"

"I'd love a martini. Gin. Very dry, up, with a twist." A martini fits Julia, she thinks, seems appropriate for a night like tonight, unknowing of what will come. She turns to him briefly.

"Play another hand, David. We have plenty of time."

He raises a finger to the dealer and a cards slide over the felt - green of the table, into his hand. One, two.

*

Labor Day weekend is one of the busiest weekends for Las Vegas casinos. Within the three-day holiday, over three million people will hit the casinos on and around the strip. This day has been long prearranged, marked on some ancient calendar as the day that the shit hit will the fan.

At nine past five-no sooner, no later; watches set to Greenwich Mean Time and definitely checked and rechecked a million times, the world as it is currently is, from Vegas to Paris, will be forever altered. Indefinitely.

Sydney has another martini. She stares into the busy lobby of the Bellagio (the luck had run dry at the Monte Carlo) and watches as travelers come to the front desk in Gucci suits and fine leather shoes imported from Italy.

The blown glass ceiling above her is gorgeous, the focal point of the less than esteemed guests who tentatively enter from the revolving doors at the front of the hotel. The people that don't belong stick out like sore thumbs: sight seers with bad haircuts, scuffed shoes, an expression of wonder written on their sad little faces as they marvel over all the gilt and glitter that exists in these mega hotels, these little havens of sin and money and the sweat of the wealthy. They lap it up like dogs, drinking in the elegance that they dream about at night in their tiny little beds at the Econolodge down the street. It's the nature of things in this world, and that makes it all so unfortunate.

Take away what the dreamers love best, and what are they left with to love?

She leaves the lobby at eight-fifteen, after twenty minutes and still no sign of him. It had been decided that she leave him at the Monte Carlo, take a walk to the Luxor and photograph the Sphinx, and then meet up at the Botanical Gardens inside the Bellagio at eight thirty. According to the diamond encrusted watch on her wrist he still has a few minutes left.

Finishing off her drink, she enters the lush surroundings of the garden, the wafting scent of hibiscus and Stargazer Lilies, of roses in topiaries. Classical music pipes overhead- Notturno, one of the countless renditions by a now exanimate composer, she thinks, and looks at the foliage with a less than astute eye.

He's silent behind her, but she feels it when he arrives. Can hear him breathing in the background, knows his body heat from a mile away. While that should strike her as odd, or even a bit disconcerting in it's intimacy, it doesn't. Her knowledge of him stems from something within herself, as though the nuances of his biology have become somehow ingrained within her, creating some inner radar that she no longer struggles with in trying to disengage; finding it both impossible to ignore and pointless to deny.

"Hello, David" She says, without turning.

"Hello, Julia" Replying, he steps beside her and from her peripheral vision she watches as he fingers a rose.

"The rules say not to touch the display, darling."

"Really?" He gives her a cocky smile. "I am not a large fan of rules."

"I've noticed that." Her tone is intentionally demure. Throngs of people pass between them, cooing over the cunning arrangements and the spray of color in late summer. Simultaneously, she resents and is drawn to them, their disenchanted voices echoing around her as they unknowingly take advantage of all the conveniences all around them in blatant proliferation.

"It's still an oven out there," A woman says as she passes "I'm so thankful for Bellagio's air system, you know?"

"People" He hisses as the complaining tourist walks by. "It's amazing all the things you can learn to take for granted."

"It is." Sydney dares a glance in his direction, sees his expression as one of wistful anger, and reaffixes her gaze on the plant in front of her.

"Everything ready, then?" She manages to ask after a long moment, swallowing the lump in her throat that has been increasingly rising since they left Carson city at noon. Dread, insidious and calculated, runs rampant within her.

"Yes." Another look in his direction and she finds that he is watching her, now, eyes locked  on the space between her shoulder and neck. Her eyes remain fixed on him, the way his eyes flutter and look away, her forwardness startling him. This proximity lends to the knowledge that he finds her nearness disconcerting, made evident by the slight rush of color along his cheekbones and his eyes as they flitter back and forth. 

It's eight- forty . Way past time to go.

*

In truth, neither knows exactly what will happen tonight at five past nine on Labor Day, a mere twenty-five minutes after they left the confines of the botanical garden. It's about following orders, even blindly, and not asking where the pieces will fall after it's all over. Thing is, she didn't think either one of them even want to know anymore. Three years spent traipsing all across the planet in search of bits and pieces of nothing has a way of desensitizing a person. It has a way of making you sincerely not want to care anymore.

But the both of them know that tonight is a very big night. Big as in the irreversible sense of the word, big as in life-changing, forever-altering. They know that it is the one time to not ask questions because they both fear the sheer enormity of the answer.

Standing in the stall of the casino's bathroom, pulling off the form-fitting dress and pulling on a functional black turtleneck, flight jacket and pants, she stumbles over her heels and tugs on her boots. The shortness of her hair makes the effort easier than it would have been in the past, and as she shuts the stall door behind her, slinging on her pack, she catches a brief glance of herself in the bathroom mirror. She forgot to take off the pearls, and she's out of time to undo the complicated clasp. Outside the restroom, she stalks though the lobby, avoiding the throngs of people and keeping up with the retreating form of her partner. The plan outside the doors is to start running, but that became complicated in the wake of onlookers that have crowded around the evening fountain display set to music. They disentangle themselves from the crowd and make their way to the back-lots of the casinos, running over a deserted parking lot and the heliport over a half mile away.

Test runs have proven that they can make it in ten if they fly fast, and each time they tried they'd only gotten faster, starting up the engine and lifting effortlessly into the night, flying over the desert sky with the noisy machine hum of the huey's propellers.

They are a minute behind schedule when she pulls open the heavy metal door and clambers inside, throwing on a seat belt and hunkering into the stiff cushions behind her. He climbs in and pulls on a helmet, gets clearance for takeoff and within another minute they are flying, high above Las Vegas. She ventures a look at him, face focused on the task ahead, complexion glowing green in the helicopters instrument panel light.

The Canyon is over seventy miles from here, and they only have eight and a half minutes to get there. Neither knows what will happen if they didn't make it, but with the intel that they did have, it's fairly evident that if they fail to reach their destination then the two of them will be screwed.

"You have the sat com phone?" His voice comes clear over the headset, the microphone jammed in her ear. It rattles against her eardrum: his tone, the roar of the engines, the choppy sound of air beside the copter.

"I have it." She affirms, grabbing her pack.

"Can you make it in six minutes?" She asks with trepidation, his face partially concealed in shadows across from her, his hands a blur on the controls.

"I'm flying fast. I think I might be able to make it, but when we land we are going to have to haul ass."

The night outside the heavy windows is endless black, the dot of white to the left the last reminder of Vegas as they soar over the land below, lost in the inky dark. She can't see stars but still looks for them. Beneath them the land is changing, mountains surrounding the Hoover Dam, loping peaks and valleys in the still dark below as they approach the canyon.

In a flash they are there, helicopter descending. "Got everything?" He yells over the sound of motors and wind.

She gives a thumbs up. Last thing she checks is the watch on her wrist. They have less than a minute.

"Leave the engine running." She yells over the noise, and he nods back at her. Each grab a pack before jumping out of the huey and running blindly in the dark.

"Here, here," he shouts.

There is real fear, now; the fear of uncertainty and knowing time is up. He presses her into an ancient wall and she collapses into the soft dirt of the canyon floor, the Colorado river close enough behind them to make a rushing gurgle, offset by the whirling of the chopper in the distance.

"Its 9:05" Shouts it, looking up at him, finding his expression to be pained. "Nothing's happening…"

As soon as she speaks the air around them fills with a reverberating, static crackle that devours all the sound between them. It's a low, primal vibration and shakes from the walls of sandstone, vibrating, ringing in her ears and rendering her temporarily deaf. Every natural noise is sucked into this vortex of endless clatter, the world rumbles from the inside out, leaving the tips of her fingers, feet and ears resonating the unearthly clamor.

There is silence. The helicopter is no longer audible. It's as though everything froze and then from a faraway place there is the water of the river and his voice, his voice as he touches her shoulders.

"Sydney, Sydney." He is saying her name, she realizes, and looks up at him dumbly.

"Are we okay? Are you okay?" She stands on unsteady legs and looks into his moss-green eyes.

Hands on each side of her face, he leans into her. "Michael?" She manages, holding her breath for a moment before he pulls away from her quickly. "Are you okay?"

"Yes." He replies curtly and moves from her, immediate dislocation from her realm, his feet leaving impressions in the soft red dirt of crushed sandstone and fossilized plants.

Beyond him, she can see the helicopter, still and silent.

*

end chapter one.

to be continued, of course…

notes: special thanks to…JESS: who always betas with mad skill even when she is GRE hell and the general tragedy that is known as the SENIOR YEAR OF COLLEGE…and to FRED, for keeping me crazy, bringing on the insanity and teaching me that COLOURS are what make the world a better place—love you both

feedback is always appreciated. Expect the next chapter within the next week- 10 days or so.

this chapter title "Take to The Sky" is from the Tori Amos song of the same name.