Title: Into the Deep
Author: Jennifer Campbell
Fandom: Alias
Spoilers: General season 2
Pairings: Sydney/Danny, Sydney/Vaughn
Rating: PG-13 for language
Disclaimer: The show Alias and its characters belong to people
with a lot more money than I have. Please don't sue.
Notes: Whew! This has been a busy week. Sorry for the extensive delay in posting this chapter. The next one is almost finished and should be coming in a few days. Thank you so so much for all the feedback. I love to hear what you think, so please keep it coming.
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"How is this possible?" Sydney choked out. "You're dead."
"So you believe me now," Irina said with a hint of a smile.
Sydney set her jaw and refused to wipe at the tears on her cheek. She wouldn't give this woman that satisfaction. "Laura Bristow died when I was six. Her car went into a lake, and she drowned. That is what I believe."
"And you weren't wrong. In a way, Laura Bristow did die that day."
Sydney shuddered, finally understanding, at least a little, the totality of her life's lies. This woman might have borne her, but she was not her mother. In all the aged and yellowing photographs, Laura Bristow radiated joy and contentment. Irina Derevko had no such secret laughter; only cold calculation, each word carefully chosen for maximum impact.
They were two distinct people. It made it easier for Sydney to categorize it that way. To acknowledge to herself, after all these years, that her mother wasn't dead would be enough to send her into a nervous breakdown. Maybe that's what Irina wanted. She'd kidnap her comatose prey as part of some revengeful plan against Sydney's father.
So maybe you think that's all I am to you now. Not a lonely girl who misses her mother, but a mere pawn in your plots and schemes. But I won't let you push me around like that. I'm stronger than that. I won't let you see me cry.
"What do you want?" she asked, only her trembling voice betraying her overwrought emotions.
"I thought that would be obvious. I want you, Sydney." She leaned forward, forcing Sydney to press closer to the porcelain sink at her back. Irina locked her with an intense look. "I want my daughter back."
Sydney didn't feel like laughing, but she forced one anyway. "You never had me in the first place."
"I can teach you. Everything I know."
"You mean how to be a traitor?" she said with venom. "How to abandon your family and leave your daughter all alone?"
Irina drew back, as if Sydney had spit in her face. A grim smile curled at Sydney's lips. So you understand now, maybe, what you did to me when you died. You also see that you've lost the power of fear over me, because I know now that you won't hurt me. I see that in your eyes, too.
"Look around you, Sydney. Look at your life. A husband and house in the suburbs, lazy students. Maybe you'll have kids, a minivan and soccer games on weekends, but that is not you. You were meant for greater things."
"You don't know me. You have no right to judge my life."
Irina's jaw tightened, and she said quietly, "I don't have time to argue with you now. In a few days time, I will be leaving Los Angeles, and I want you to come with me." She put a finger to Sydney's lips before the retort could come. "I'll give you time to think about it. We will talk again soon."
She grabbed her purse from the floor and vanished out the bathroom door as silently as she had come, leaving Sydney panting in the corner and clutching a small brown bear. The room spun a little, so she closed her eyes and focused on taking air into her lungs. Just breathe. Just keep breathing. You'll be all right.
She saw images behind her eyelids, flashes of faces. Her father, her mother, Danny, Francie and Will. Then newer ones. Irina Derevko, different from her mother yet also the same. Agent Vaughn.
There she stopped. Her eyes snapped open, and she inhaled sharply. "Vaughn."
She grabbed her purse and bolted out the door, only to remember where she was, then she slipped back into the bathroom again. She couldn't go running aimlessly around a crowded restaurant. No, she needed a plan. Think, Sydney, think.
Irina had implied that she had done something with Vaughn, to get him out of the way, but she wouldn't have done it in the restaurant. Too many witnesses. She would have taken him outside, into the dark, and then left him there.
Sydney entered the short hallway outside the bathroom and unhurriedly turned the corner into the eating area. She spotted Danny in the far corner, chin propped up in one hand while he studied a painting hanging above the table. With a deep breath, Sydney straightened her back, pushed a lock of hair from her forehead, and walked out. She reached the front door in seconds, but it felt like hours, and she slipped outside without incident.
A winter wind hit her full in the face, and she shivered. She wished she had her coat, and smiled at the thought of Danny's reaction had she retrieved it from her chair before heading outside. Wrapping her arms around her chest, she looked both ways up the sidewalk, across the empty street decorated in Christmas lights. This area of town was well-lit, but she saw no sign of Vaughn.
She fumbled with her purse clasp and pulled out her CIA cell phone. With trembling fingers, she dialed Vaughn's number. It rang twice before Sydney realized she could hear Vaughn's own phone ringing from somewhere close by, off to her left. She followed the sound to the mouth of an alley, behind the restaurant. His phone lay discarded on the cement.
Sydney turned off her phone and picked up his. She squinted as she tried to see into the alley, but the shadows penetrated too deep. She could see the back door of the restaurant only by its porch light. Garbage cans, some overflowing, were scattered about.
Wind ruffled Sydney's hair, and she hugged herself tighter. She feared to walk into that darkness, but she forced herself to step forward. Then again. She kept her eyes pointed straight ahead. On the third step, her toe encountered something soft, and she looked down. It was a man in a suit, face down, his limbs splayed in all directions. Holding her breath, she rolled him over. It wasn't Vaughn. The man's vacant eyes stared to the sky, and his neck was bent at an impossible angle.
From farther into the alley came a sound, like a low groan. Sydney picked her way back until she found another man on the ground, this one very much alive. She knelt beside him and breathed a relieved sigh. She helped him scoot back until he could prop himself up against a brick wall. Vaughn rubbed at the back of his neck and blinked owlishly.
This close to the restaurant's back door and porch light, Sydney could see him clearly. Small cuts covered his face, and his suit jacket was ripped down one arm from shoulder to wrist.
"Vaughn. Are you all right?"
He didn't look it, but he nodded anyway. "Agent Johnson ..."
"I think he might be dead. There's a body, back toward the street."
"Derevko."
"Yes."
He rubbed his neck again. "Agent Johnson wasn't answering his phone, so I came outside to check on him. That's the last thing I remember. I must have gotten hit from behind." His eyes found his phone, still in her hand. "Can I have my phone?"
Sydney handed it to him, and he dialed. "This is Agent Vaughn at Panolli's Italian Restaurant on Sixth Street. ... Yes. ... I need a backup team here now. We have an agent down. ... Yes. ... Just get here."
He hung up and looked at Sydney. "Did she hurt you?"
"No."
"What did she want then?"
Sydney opened her mouth but words wouldn't come. Even though Vaughn might know that Irina was Sydney's mother, somehow she couldn't bring herself to talk about it. Not yet. Hearing Vaughn confirm the truth would give it a validity that she wouldn't be able to ignore, and she couldn't afford to break down right now.
"Vaughn, look." She pointed at his sleeve, visible through his ripped jacket. "You're bleeding through your shirt. It looks bad."
She reached for him, but he drew back. "I'm fine."
"Don't be a baby." She gently unbuttoned his cuff and rolled it back, revealing a bloody gash on his forearm. "It's deep. This will probably need stitches."
"That's your prognosis, Doctor Bristow?" He looked amused, but hissed as she probed the skin above the cut.
"My husband is in medicine, so I've picked up some basic knowledge. You really should go to a hospital."
"Later. There's a CIA team on the way. I need to be here until they arrive. I can't leave you alone."
She could see by his resolute expression that he meant it. He would stay here, even if that meant bleeding to death. Stupid man, Sydney thought. He had so little concern for his own welfare. At the same time, though, she couldn't help but admire his dedication, and appreciate that he wouldn't leave her without protection.
"Then maybe I can patch you up a little." She fished around in her purse until she found a small bottle of rubbing alcohol, some cotton balls and gauze. "Now give me your arm and try not to move."
Vaughn obeyed. "Do you have an entire pharmacy in that bag?"
"I like to be prepared," she said with a smile.
Vaughn didn't make a sound as she dabbed the cut clean, but his muscles tensed in pain. She wrapped his arm in gauze and tied it in place. Already the white cloth was staining red, but she could do nothing else for him. She packed up her purse as Vaughn examined her handiwork.
"You have a gentle touch. Thank you."
"You're welcome."
"I'm sorry about all this, Sydney. It's my job to protect you, and I take it very seriously. I want you to know that, despite the debacle this night has become."
"I know. Thank you."
Their eyes met, and for a moment, Sydney saw something there that transcended simple gratitude. It was how Danny looked at her sometimes, in a way that made her feel giddy and warm, and told her so much more than words. At the same time, though, Vaughn's gaze conveyed a terrible sadness. The look unnerved her, but she couldn't turn away. Finally, he lowered his eyes, and the moment passed.
Sydney cleared her throat. "I should get back. I told Danny I was going to the bathroom, and that was ten or fifteen minutes ago."
"Go. I'll keep watch in case Derevko shows."
"She won't be back tonight."
"You sound so confident of that."
"I don't know why, but I am," she said as she stood and wiped the alley's grime off her pants. It wouldn't do to have Danny notice that.
Sydney gave him a small smile before going to the back door and trying the knob. It was unlocked, thankfully, so she gave Vaughn one last look before slipping inside and finding herself in the kitchen. She made it halfway through the maze of metal tables and stoves before someone stopped her. A teenage boy with a bad complexion yelled at her from a dishwashing sink.
"Hey, what are you doing back here?"
Sydney gave him her best impression of a deer in headlights. "I was trying to find the bathroom. I got lost."
The boy pointed. "Through that door and to your left."
"Thank you."
Once in the bathroom, she picked up her teddy bear from the floor -- she must have dropped him in her haste to find Vaughn -- and stuffed him in her purse. After a quick check of her hair and makeup, she headed back to the dining room. Danny saw her and smiled.
"Took you long enough. I was about to call out the guard."
Sydney sat down. "Don't exaggerate. You know girls always take a long time in the bathroom. Don't we have our food yet?"
"The waiter brought it out, but I asked him to hold it in the kitchen until you came back. I figured you wouldn't appreciate cold eggplant."
"Thanks," Sydney said, reaching across the table to squeeze his hand. "That was really thoughtful."
"It's my job to take care of you."
She laughed lightly. "I'm quite a handful. Are you sure you're up to it?"
"You know, I don't know. I might need a trial period, just to be sure."
She swatted at him, and they both laughed. The waiter returned with their food then. Danny chatted through the meal, and Sydney gave responses at the appropriate intervals, but her attention drifted. She wanted to break in and tell Danny everything, an urge so strong it was almost physical. She knew, though, that doing so would foolishly put him in danger.
So she couldn't breathe a word to her husband, or her friends, about what her life had become. She felt angry with her father, who had lied about himself and her mother for Sydney's entire life. And now Irina Derevko had come with more secrets to further deepen the chasm of deceit between Sydney and her loved ones. Irina had killed a CIA agent and almost killed Vaughn, and she wanted Sydney to go with her. What scared Sydney was that a small part of her found the offer tempting -- an opportunity to know the mother she had thought was dead, and to experience a life of excitement and danger.
But if she said no, how far would Irina go to change her mind? Would she abduct her, torment her, hurt Danny or her friends?
All through dinner Sydney smiled until her cheekbones ached, but underneath, she felt terribly alone.
#
Sydney woke up around noon the next day and started to panic about missing classes before she remembered it was Saturday. She had the bed to herself. Danny had probably been awake for hours. She burrowed under the sheets and lay there for several minutes, wondering whether she could simply stay there all day. She knew hiding from the world wasn't the answer, though, so eventually she crawled out, got dressed and wandered into the kitchen for breakfast.
"She emerges! She lives!"
Sydney stuck out her tongue at Danny, right before he pinned her against the kitchen counter. She squealed and made half-hearted efforts to get away, forcing Danny to press closer.
"Stick out your tongue again," he said, "and I'll have to catch it."
So of course she did, and giggled as he tried to kiss her. She ducked her head at the last second, and his lips met with her eyebrow. He kissed it passionately.
"Ugh, that's messy," Sydney said, wiping her face with her sleeve. "Good morning to you, too."
"Good afternoon, more like."
"Whatever. It's Saturday. I don't care."
Danny pulled back enough for Sydney to finish fixing herself a bowl of cereal. Danny refilled his coffee mug, and they both sat at the table.
As she chowed down on Cheerios, she scanned the newspaper, looking for reports on a disturbance at the restaurant last night -- or worse, a murder -- but to her relief, she found nothing. She supposed the CIA had a way of covering up such things.
As she turned to the comics, she became aware that Danny was watching her intently, his eyes fixed on her as though she were a specimen on a laboratory table, but he spoke not a word. She tried to ignore it, though maintaining her calm facade was exhausting. Her mind darted in all directions, through all the things she was hiding from her husband. Several minutes passed, and still his eyes never wavered.
"All right," she said, giving up. "What's wrong?"
"Actually, I'm worried that there's something wrong with you. These past few days you've been ... distant. Preoccupied. I can't help but think there's something you're not telling me."
"We always tell each other everything."
"That's not an answer."
She said lightly, "Danny, there's no reason for the third degree. Everything is fine." Hoping to satisfy him, she added, "It's been a long week is all."
He thought about that, then shook his head. "Syd, I know you. I'm not buying it."
"What do I have to say to convince you, then?"
"How about the truth?"
She threw down her spoon. "Look --"
A doorbell interrupted them. Danny gave Sydney a look that clearly said they weren't through with this, then got up to answer the door. She finished slurping up milk from her bowl as she heard footsteps approaching. Two sets of them. Danny rounded the corner, followed by someone Sydney hadn't expected -- and didn't want to see at all.
Jack stopped in the kitchen doorway and fixed his daughter with his trademark coolness, an attitude that meant business.
"Sydney, we need to talk."
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