Questions & Answers
Disclaimer:
I do not own Alias; ABC, Bad Robot Productions and JJ Abrams do, and I give
full acknowledgement of that (good work guys). I do not own and am not affiliated
in any way, with the brands mentioned in this piece (such as Ford, BWM or Colt),
more than likely I've used them because they're known, or because they're very
nice bits of kit that I hope to have one day. Finally, I'm a student, don't
sue me, I've got nothing worth taking.
Authors note:
Sorry for the long break folkes; a combination of work and my ISP mucking me around has kept me at bay and may do so for some time to come
As such, I'll add chapters as and when I can, but rest assured, I've not stopped working on this, and there will be more chapters to come
Thanks
- Spyder
Time frame:
None - Just generally set after Sydney becomes a double agent.
The rest of the flight back to LAX was uneventful, with all three agents managing to get at least six hours of sleep during the ten hour flight.
Even before getting off the plane, Weiss had his mobile in hand and was calling for someone from the LA office to meet them at the airport - to his surprise; Devlin arrived with two accompanying agents, and took Vaughn and Weiss back to a CIA safe house for debriefing and psych analysis.
They purposefully left Sydney to get a cab home, fearing that she would be tracked by SD-6's Security section. Having a car with CIA plates pull up to her house was probably not the best thing, given the current tension.
She had barely made it in the door when the phone rang.
With no sign of either Francie or Will, Sydney dumped her bag on the floor just in time to pick it up.
"Hello?" she said, slightly peeved at the interruption
"Sydney, thank god you're in" it was her father, he sounded anxious.
"Hey Dad, what's…" she was cut off; her father was definitely in an impatient mood
"Sydney, I need to see you at SD-6 now - Sloane knows you're back and wants to talk to you. We've been contacted by whoever attacked SD-9" he was rushing his words, as if being pressured to talk.
Sydney tried to protest, but was interrupted again. "But…"
"I know you've only got back, but I assure you, I will come down there and drag you to SD-6 if I have to." His words were demandingly harsh "Sydney, listen to me, this is important and we need you here now"
"Ok, ok" she said, giving in "I'm coming in". Looking at her watch quickly and picking up her car keys she headed for the door. "I'll be there in 20 minutes".
She was about to say something else, but again, her father cut her off "Good". A single tone came from the phone, indicating that he had hung up.
Infuriated at his impatience, Sydney threw the phone at the sofa and stormed out of the house towards her car.
Pulling out of the drive quickly Sydney drove to the bank with an almost deadly rage around her, jumping a set of traffic lights, and nearly causing a traffic accident, but by the time she pulled into the parking lot, it suddenly dawned on her how urgently Sloane needed to see her, as a pair from Security section were waiting by the garage's main entrance, while another agent opened the heavy metal doors that lead to SD-6's underground entrance.
Looking around, she could see at least six, if not more agents from security section down in the garage area - a pair by the elevator, and another pair, visibly armed, walked towards her car and motioned for her to get out.
She wasn't going to argue.
As she got out, one of the guards came up to meet her. "Ms Bristow, glad to see you're back - go straight to the briefing room, Mr Sloane's waiting"
She just nodded, and walked by.
"Oh Ms Bristow" the guard said, turning towards her. A cold knot formed in her stomach.
"Yes?" she asked curiously.
"Keys please - we'll park your car somewhere"
Smiling, she threw him the keys, and then jogged to the elevator, where she was met by another security section agent who escorted her straight through the scanner room, and into the main meeting room, where she was greeted by a cabal of the most senior agents at SD-6; Arvin Sloane, Jack Bristow, Karl Dryer, David McCullagh and Audrey Simmons, all bearing the harsh glare that came with more bad news.
Indicating to the empty chair at the far end of the table, Sloane spoke calmly "Thank you for coming in Agent Bristow, please, take a seat" Motioning to the guard by the door, he simply ushered him away with a flick of the hand, the guard made sure to firmly close the door on his way out.
Sydney's stomach went cold, and an inquisitive look towards her father revealed nothing than an emotional wall.
"Sydney, I've asked you here specifically because you are the only known surviving member of the party of agents we sent into SD-9 this week" Sloane said, leaning forward on the table. "We'd like to hear your account of the events?"
"Only surviving agent?" Sydney said, eyes agape with fear for her partner "What happened to everyone else?"
Audrey Simmons answered before Sloane could "Please Agent Bristow, this is urgent, we can answer any questions afterwards"
Despite not liking the answer, Sydney just nodded, and gave off her perfectly rehearsed account of the last few days, in as much detail as possible, from her departure from LAX to JFK airport, the day in New York, and then the flight to Glasgow.
Sitting back in his seat, Karl Dryer stopped fiddling with his pen and spoke up for the first time. "Why did you go to New York and then to Glasgow Ms Bristow?"
Before she could answer, Sloane surprisingly jumped to her defence. "Jack Bristow came to me, informing me that he'd booked Sydney on a less direct route to England for safety" he turned to look at his partner, who was hidden away in the shadows, before turning back to Dryer "It appears he did the right thing"
Defeated, Dryer backed down, returning to scribbling notes on his pad.
The hours seemed to stretch with each question, and Sydney was getting a little uneasy about the questioning. Her father on the other hand, showed no outward signs of anything which was usual, yet although that would normally have been a bad sign, she took it as somewhat of a good omen.
As her report drew near its conclusion, Sydney began to realise that they were asking less and less questions and again wondered if this was a good sign, but she still had to go over the assault on the café, which she was sure would bring a whole new round of questions.
She was right - she'd not even finished her first sentence on the assault before she was bombarded by questions, ranging from 'when did you first realise there was a problem' to 'what signs did you look out for when meeting the group' and nearly every other possible derivative in-between.
The group stopped questioning for a moment, and Sydney snuck a peek at her watch - they'd been in there for nearly 4 hours non-stop. A voice startled her.
"Have an appointment, Ms Bristow?" Audrey Simmons asked sharply.
"No, just wondering whether I'll get home to watch the hockey match tonight" was her cool, but smart-assed reply. Jack, predictably, frowned. Sloane let out a laugh, and Simmons just backed down.
"Just a few more questions, Ms Bristow" McCullagh said in a rather calming voice "and please, be as detailed and descriptive as possible"
Sydney nodded, and shot a small glare at Audrey Simmons, who scowled back. Jack cleared his throat audibly, refocusing the attentions of the group on their work.
Leaning forward, Sloane looked forward and asked Sydney to continue, which she did, going over each motion slowly and clearly, so that there was no confusion in her words.
Sydney managed to finish with barely two questions asked, but a look on their faces that told her there was more to come.
"Ms Bristow" Dryer said, scribbling down a few notes on his pad "can you describe this 'man in a black trenchcoat' with more detail?"
"No, sir, I cannot - There was only a very brief moment of eye contact and for most of the attack, he had his back towards me" she said, clinically.
Dryer handed his pad to McCullagh, who nodded "Ms Bristow - could you do a photo fit identification of this man?"
She dropped her head to think about it, to remember the face of the man who shot her friends, and hold it in her memory. After a moment, she looked up, and gave a single word answer. "Yes"
With that, the interrogation group seemed to grimace and smile simultaneously - concern and almost a visible joy appearing on their faces at the same time.
"Good" Sloane took charge of the conversation "Karl, can you get everything you need set up please". With that Dryer nodded and left the room, leaving Sydney in a room with a foursome of highly trained agents, throwing wordless glances at each other, but the decision had been made.
"Sydney, as an answer to you're question earlier, we'd like you to listen to something that was hand delivered to the SD-6 offices this morning" Jack spoke up, Sloane just sitting there leaning on his hand.
Stretching over, he pressed a single button on the remote, and the room was filled with a sudden crackle of static.
"This is a message to Arvin Sloane and the heads of SD-6" the voice was scrambled, with an added reverb in the background. "We are holding your agents, and at the moment, they are in good hands. Whether they remain that way is down to you."
A pause. "We know the locations of every one of your sites around the world, and know you have a fortified listening and storage facility in Oman. In twenty-four hours of you receiving this message, we will attack the base, and eliminate anyone present. This will be your only forewarning of an assault by us. Cooperate with us, and we will be lenient, offend us or attempt to retaliate in any form, and you will face our wrath."
"SD-9 was the first SD cell to fall, and will not be the last. You have been warned"
Static resumed, and the message ended, but no-one moved.
A million questions appeared in Sydney's head, but she just asked the first two she thought of. "What do they mean 'cooperate'? Who are these people?"
"Valid questions, but the answer is, we don't know - neither who they are, nor what they mean by cooperate. The message gave no way of contacting them, so we are at a disadvantage"
Sydney waved her father off nonchalantly. "What do they mean 'attack'? A repeat of what happened at SD-9?"
No-one answered, simply because they'd already given her the answer - they didn't know.
For once SD-6, with all its intelligence assets had been caught out by something they even didn't realise existed.
The silence forced her to change her tactics somewhat. "Okay, so what's going on - am I being sent to Oman?"
"No, we've already called in reinforcements from our allies to bolster the base's defence - there's nothing else we can do from here" Jack responded.
Sydney looked down, shut out by her own father.
"Sydney, I'd like you to report to Dryer down in Psych to ID this man - we need to find out as much as we can about him and his organisation"
Nodding, Sydney got up, and began to walk to the door. "And Sydney, its good to have you back in one piece" Sloane said, gratefully, getting a nod and a smile in response, before Sydney walked down the hall, towards Psych and her unscheduled meeting with Karl Dryer.