I have had some complaints that Vaughn is a bit out of character. I am sorry. I haven't seen Alias in a while, because I have been out of the country. And it is an AU fic, meaning I can make the people anyway I want to. If I wanted to, I could make Sydney as mean as Slone. Hmmm… but it also means that I can mold the characters to make them fit the part. DEAL WITH IT!!
OH, and I am so sorry if you had to read this when this chapter was just one large paragraph. FFN messed up my formatting. Paragraphs are my friends. Sometimes I add them more than nessary. Seriously, my English teacher told me that last year. It was all FFN. Sorry.
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"You look happy." Dixon said, the next morning, when Sydney sat down at her desk.
"I am." She said, quickly smiling.
Sydney sat in the briefing room, staring at her computer screen. She didn't really see what was on it, but she was staring at it any way. She was thinking about the night before. No one suspected a thing. People just noticed that she was happier. Not that she was dating someone she shouldn't. "The document Bristow and Dixon recovered last week, we have discovered is a fake. We do however know who has the original." Slone said. Sydney snapped to attention. She went through all that trouble to get that document, she went through all that trouble to make sure that SD-6 got the original, and it turned out to be a fake. Slone used the remote and brought up a different scream. "Julio Nava. An enemy of SD-6."
"KGB, or K- directorate?" Sydney asked.
"Neither. We don't know who he is working for. Mostly a free lancer that sometimes works for himself." He showed a picture of a young Hispanic guy. Sydney was slightly surprised. Most of the guys that they had been instructed to destroy were her father's age, not hers. "Only been in intelligence for 5 years, but he's a quick learner. Within a year he had stolen things from almost every intelligence office out there, making enemies of all. But he is still loyal to his employer, and that is whoever has employed him at the minute. SD-6 has employed him once."
"Are we to take the document?" Dixon asked.
"No, you are there to only set bugs. This document is an important Rembaldi document, but, Nava has been known to hide things well. When his employer calls, we want to be sure to find out where he hid it."
"Why are you sending us?" Sydney asked, this normally wasn't the type of mission she was sent on.
"We already sent two teams down there. Nava's place is under some of the highest security. Neither team made it out alive." Sydney gulped. This didn't sound good. The first teams were some of the best. When Slone sent agents out like Sydney and Dixon, it was normally for the recovery of an artifact.
"Won't he have a bug-proof house?" Dixon challenged. Slone turned to Marshall, who stood up.
"Hi! Ok, I have really out did my self this time. I mean really out did myself. This looks like, a pen. You'd write with it. And you can. It's filled with ink. Well, only half of it is filled with ink. The other half is the bug. Just put it by the phone, replacing it with the other one there. It has in it something that will descramble, and scrambler. We will only get clear recordings." Marshall said, showing the pen to the three in the briefing room. Sydney smiled. Marshall could be cute when he was showing the latest things he was making. Or when ever he was even slightly nervous.
Sydney showed up early to meet with Weiss at the warehouse. She sat on an old desk, swinging her legs. A car pulled up. Sydney looked hopefully at the occupants of the car, and her hopes fell when she saw that Vaughn wasn't one of them. In fact, the only person in the car was Weiss. "Glad to see you on time." Weiss said, sitting in a chair across from Sydney.
"Got off early, had the time. I can't go home."
"What? Why? Should we put you in the safe house?" Weiss said. Part of Sydney smiled. Weiss did care enough to make sure that Sydney was safe, but beyond that, he really didn't care.
"Oh no, it's not like that. I just am tired of telling lies to my friends."
"Well, you have to."
"What's my counter mission?"
"Nava actually works for the CIA. The document is the original and is in the possession of the CIA. Nava is living at one of the CIA safe houses."
"Is what Slone told me true? Does he really have all those enemies?"
"Yes. CIA only got a hold of him in the past year." Weiss said. He pulled out a map. "Nava is our take down plan."
"How?"
"SD-6 is so involved with getting the document that they will go to any lengths to get their hands on it."
"So how does that apply to the take down?"
"The agents they think are dead are just being held prisoner. Eventually we will use a ransom to get them down."
"Slone won't go for it. He'll sacrifice everyone to get his money."
"Not if we have something that isn't an agent."
"Are you talking about taking Emily ransom?"
"No, no, no. We're going to make a sacrifice."
"I don't understand how this works out in the end."
"Nor do I. But the details of the mission are so classified, that agents are just told what they need to do to get the mission done."
"So, what's my counter mission?"
"You are to unsuccessfully place a bug. We will capture you and your partner, and hold you captive until the actual take down."
"I have to disappear from the face of the earth?"
"Yes, and no."
"Will I be able to come back?"
"Oh yes."
"Good. But what will I tell my friends?"
"That you're on a trip. Once you are captured, you are to call them, leave a message saying that you'll be caught up in Dallas for another week or so."
"Slone has got my house, and my friend's phones bugged."
"We will have an agent outside your house silencing it."
"But afterwards? My house will still be bugged when Francie tells Will."
"Don't worry about that. All you have to worry about is making the mission fail."
"They're my friends."
"And they are in the good hands of the CIA." Sydney crossed her arms, and leaned back.
"Just make the mission fail?"
"That's it."
"Ok. I'll do it." Sydney, not happy with the results of the meeting, walked away without so much as a good bye, and walked into her car.
"Good luck!" Weiss called as Sydney drove away.
Sydney through her keys on her bed and fell backwards. True she did like the fact that Weiss had underestimated how long it would be until the take down, and it was two weeks earlier than expected. But she didn't like the idea of disappearing for two weeks. It was just too suspicious.
Francie poked her head into Sydney's room. She saw her friend laying there, and joined her. "Hey." Francie said.
"Hey. I got another trip." Sydney said.
"Again? You went on one like,"
"Last week. I'm thinking about quitting. What do you think I should do?"
"Its up to you. But whatever you do that Michael guy from the club called. He wants you to call him back." Sydney shot up.
"Where's his number?" She asked.
"By the phone." Francie said. She smiled. She hadn't seen Sydney act like that about any guy since Danny.
Sydney scrambled off the bed, and went to the phone and began dialing the number to Vaughn's apartment. Francie watched and smiled from a distance watching Sydney talking to this guy like she was in high school again. Sydney hung up the phone, and turned to Francie. "Packing can wait. I'm going to meet Michael at a restaurant."
"Now?"
"Well, he gave me an hour to get ready, and to get over there!"
"What was he thinking? Getting ready in an hour?"
"I don't know." Sydney ran down the hall to the bathroom.
"You look great. I'll drive you." Francie said, an hour later.
"I can drive."
"Actually you can't." Will said from behind the couch.
"Hey Will. What do you mean I can't?"
"Well, I took your car out to get a gallon of milk, but I totaled it."
"In an hour?"
"I hit the post at the end of the street."
"Wha-"
"There was a dog, and I swerved."
"I'll deal with that later. I got to meet Michael." Sydney said.
"I'll drive you." Francie said, grabbing her keys.
"Thanks." Sydney hoped that when she saw Vaughn her day would get better. She thought that there was no way it could get any worse. A suicide mission, a risk on her friends, a totaled car. Sitting in the car with Francie, something hit Sydney. How was she supposed to get to her warehouse meetings with her car totaled? Or work. They didn't like other people knowing where the building is. But they didn't keep it a secret either. She saw Michael's smiling face at the restaurant and she knew everything was going to be alright.