AN: Sorry for the late update. There's no excuse really. Just didn't get around to it. To chatnoir- to make it work with my story, it was better that he didn't go to college to be in the CIA. I'm not sure if that made sense, but yeah. Thanks to everyone for their reviews! I enjoyed reading them. Alright, onto the fic and the chapter you've all been waiting for. Sorry it took so long to get here!

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Chapter 5

Vaughn's POV

Vaughn turned off the engine to his car, and sat there staring off into the distance. He was early and exhausted. No matter what he did, Vaughn just couldn't sleep last night. At least Sydney had the luxury of not knowing. He didn't. Tossing and turning until 2 A.M., he was finally able to fall asleep. Unfortunately, Vaughn woke up once again at 3 A.M. and didn't sleep for the rest of the night. How he was operating on one hour of sleep was beyond him.

Getting out of his car, he headed inside the warehouse. It was dark and cold, a contrast to the morning sky outside. As Vaughn walked, he could hear his footsteps echoing around him. Sitting on one of the tables, he played with his hands as he waited for Sydney to come. It would be another fifteen minutes though.

As he sat waiting, he thought back to the many memories they shared: The homecoming dance; Sydney breaking her arm; her sixteenth birthday; the trip to Las Vegas; prom, and graduation. Some of the memories had been happy...some of them sad.

How Sydney got into this business was beyond him. She had always told him that she wanted to be a teacher and follow in her mother's footsteps. Being a spy, a double agent no less, wasn't even on the same scale as being an English teacher. There was danger in every mission, and it was a bleak lifestyle most of the time. He had reasons for doing what he does, but what was hers?

After reading her profile, his heart ached from the amount of hurt she had gone through. Not only had she gotten many injuries during some of her missions, but her fiance had been killed as well. If that wasn't bad, he didn't know what was.

Vaughn was so lost in his thoughts, he almost didn't hear her distinct footsteps. He felt his breath get caught in his throat. Trying to calm himself down, he got off the table and opened her folder pretending to look at it. Vaughn turned around so that his back would be to her when she came in. Hopefully he would came down by then.

The closer and closer her footsteps got, the harder his heart pounded. Finally, Vaughn heard her enter the area where they were debriefing.

"Sorry I'm late. My car wouldn't start yesterday so I had to get it fixed and the repairs just got done 20 minutes a go."

Knowing he had to face her eventually, Vaughn turned around. He heard a barely audible gasp as he spoke. "It's okay. I wasn't really paying attention to the time."

"Mike?" Vaughn looked in her eyes trying to decipher her emotions. All he could see was shock.

"Hello, Sy-" Vaughn cleared his throat. He was supposed professional and calling her Sydney would not be professional. "Agent Bristow."

"What are you doing here?" It was said in a small tone and there seemed to be distress in her voice.

"I'm your new handler." As much as he wanted, Vaughn couldn't seem to take his eyes off the woman who had stole his heart.

"But how?" She didn't say it, but he knew what she meant. How could Devlin choose him knowing their history? How did he agree to this?

"Your father requested me to be your handler, and Devlin didn't want to hear any objections."

"My father wanted this?"

Vaughn shook his head. "I don't understand it either."

Sydney laughed bitterly. "My father is full of mysteries," she paused. "I thought I knew him all this time, and then I find out he's a double agent and I've been working for the enemy all these years."

Vaughn looked at the ground. "About your fiance...I'm sorry."

"Thank you. I'm sorry you were assigned to me. I know you didn't want to be."

"It's okay." They were both silent for an awkward moment before Sydney spoke.

"So what's my countermission?"

"It's pretty simple. All you need to do is switch the disk with this fake one." He handed her the disk. "We've already got the information, but that doesn't mean we want them to get it."

Sydney nodded. "I'm sorry, Mike."

"It was a long time ago." Vaughn said in a low tone.

"Still, I shouldn't have let you go like that. Everything we had was gone that night and it's all my fault."

Vaughn ran a hand through his hair and sighed. "And what did we have, Sydney?"

Sydney looked up at him in confusion. "Friendship, comfort," she paused. "love."

"Sometimes I wonder if it was all an illusion." His voice was getting dangerously low.

"You can't seriously believe that." Sydney looked at him in disbelief. Tears were shining in her eyes.

"If we had all that, why did we let it go so easily? Why didn't you stop me from leaving?"

"I was scared, Michael. I was scared of getting hurt."

"Don't you think I was too, Sydney? Don't you think you hurt me when you weren't willing to take a risk for our relationship? I would have stayed, Sydney. Just one word from you and I would have kissed Washington D.C. goodbye."

"You're right. I didn't want to risk it. Besides you really wanted to go to Washington D.C. Who was I to stop you?"

"It would have been my choice." Sydney just shook her head and sighed. There was a long silence. Vaughn took a quick look at his watch and saw that it was getting late.

"You'd better go. Your flight's in two hours." Sydney nodded her head and started to get ready to leave. As she started moving towards the entrance to the warehouse, Vaughn called after her.

"Hey, Sydney." Sydney turned around and looked at him expectantly.

"Be careful." She didn't say anything, but Vaughn could see her eyes visibly soften.

Vaughn stayed there a long time after Sydney left. He thought about their conversation and her mission. There were too many things going on and too little time to think about it all. Was their relationship ever going to be the same? Did he even want it to be the same? If they did become...friends, it would become more dangerous. As agents, they were trained to not get too attached and to compartmentalize their feelings. With Sydney, he didn't think he could do that. Vaughn sighed and decided it was probably time to head to CIA headquarters.

As he went out to his car, Vaughn suddenly realized that tonight was his and Alice's one year anniversary and he hadn't gotten anything for her.

*I know this one was a little shorter then some of my other chapters, but hey, there wasn't a flashback scene so I didn't have much to write. I think I've come up with a new storyline to take this story though so we'll have to see how that works out.