(26 months post-The Telling)
Irina fidgeted with her pencil. Debriefing. This was the last straw. When she had agreed 2 years previous to help Jack by working with the CIA, she had imagined any number of drawbacks. Never had she considered it would be as bad as this.
She listened with half an ear as she considered happily what form Jack's gratitude would take. Her pencil snapped in half. As long as he was okay, she thought worriedly.
"Agent Dixon, tell me again what you observed."
"Agent Bristow was ordered to surrender. He refused."
"He refused?"
"His exact words were, 'Go to hell'," responded Dixon flatly.
Irina twirled one of the pencil halves in her fingers. Stupid, she thought chidingly. It let us know exactly where you were. And that it was you, and not someone else. The pencil stilled in her fingers.
"And then what happened?"
"Agent Bristow charged us, firing his gun in our direction."
"Was anyone hurt?"
"No." Dixon paused. "His angle was off. The shots went high."
Irina stopped breathing. The shots went high. She hadn't noticed – she had been too stunned at hearing Jack's voice. But…but that could only mean…she flashed back to their last night together…oh god, he had been saying goodbye…
"Ms. Derevko, could you confirm Agent Dixon's report?"
"Ms. Derevko?"
***
Despair was Jack's constant companion during those first few days in the hospital. Each waking moment for the past 17 months had been dedicated to reaching this point. He had utilized every last ounce of his skill as a tactician; it defied belief that he had failed. No, not that he had failed. That he had failed *her*.
Jack's proximity to Sydney's bed gave him immediate access to every doctor and nurse working on her case. Each was rigorously interrogated with withering cross-examination. One nurse took the rest of the day off after he was finished with her. The reports, however, were consistent. Sydney was in a holding pattern – physically fine, but unresponsive. "Waiting", they had termed it. Waiting for what, he snarled back. Shrugs were the response. "A reason for waking up," one person offered.
On day 3, he asked the nurses to move his bed closer to hers. He still couldn't sit up, but he could turn his head and watch her slow breathing. Somehow, he now found it comforting to be near her. If he closed his eyes, he could imagine she was sleeping.
Lying so close to her, Jack became aware that each person approaching Sydney's bed would talk to her. Why do you do that? Jack had asked, irritated. "In case she's listening," was the response. Ridiculous, he grumbled to himself. As if that would make a difference.
On day 5, with a self-conscious sidelong glance, he began to talk to her himself. Slowly and hesitantly. It was not, he thought defensively to himself, as if he had anything better to do. He kept up a strained conversational patter for 30 minutes, then exhausted, slept. When he awoke, he began again.
On day 7, he looked carefully for progress. Finding none, he lay silent in his bed, brooding. He had *never* been able to talk to her. Once she had reached her teenage years, anyway. If she were listening, which reason told him was doubtful, she was probably just tuning him out.
On day 8, he began to talk to her again, but this time of her childhood and shared memories, both good and bad. Confidence returned. It was a time when they had loved each other openly and without reserve. As his voice grew stronger, he would occasionally sing to her, lullabies from when she had been small, tunes they had shared together as she had gotten older. Singing with his eyes closed, he was oblivious to the nursing staff creeping closer to better hear his rich baritone.
On day 10, he silently catalogued all the things he had wanted to tell her, but somehow never had. It was a depressingly long list. Now, he thought dispiritedly, was as good a time as he was likely to get. Perhaps the last time. He began.
On day 11, he asked her forgiveness for being such a bad father.
On day 13, he told her he loved her.
On day 14, she opened her eyes.
**
Jack had been singing. Later he could not remember exactly which tune. He had finished, and was lying back, with his eyes closed. Remembering when Sydney had been young, and would beg him to sing again. "Please, daddy, just one more time?" Funny how he could remember those times, even better than her teenage years. He could see her now, climbing into his lap, wheedling.
"Please, daddy, just one more time?" Jack's eyes flew open. The sound, in a voice rusty with disuse, had come from the bed next to his. Sydney? Jack sat up quickly and looked over at his daughter, oblivious to the monitor alarms pinging through the room. Her eyes – her eyes were open? "Please, daddy?"
After taking several deep breaths to swallow the lump in his throat, Jack began again. Nurses who had come rushing over to sedate the troublesome Mr. Bristow backed off respectfully, one heading for a phone. When Jack finished, his voice trembling, Sydney looked at him in wonder. "Where…where are we, dad?"
Jack lay back in his bed and wept.