Sark looked through the small window in the door that Sydney said was supposed to be to the room that Kaylee was being held in. He couldn't see much since the window was pretty built up with dirt and grime. He could vaguely make out a bed with no mattress and a heap of clothes and blankets on the floor.

"Obviously no one has lived her in a while," he mumbled to himself. "Damnit, Syd. How could you be wrong about something so important?" However, he found himself unable to walk away from that door. He still had a lot of faith in Sydney. So much faith that he was willing to break into this room before he started going from room to room searching for her. He was willing to waste some precious time just to be sure that she was truly wrong.

The lock on the door was fairly old and looked like it was about to rust out. Sark only had to kick the door once really hard to get it to open. He stared into the room, realizing that he was right in his assessment. There was really only a pile of blankets and clothes and a mattress-less bed.

When he had kicked the door, it slammed back into the wall and flung itself half closed again. He shoved it out of his way so that he could enter the room and do a full analysis of what was inside. The door smashed against the wall again, and that's when he noticed something he had missed the first time he opened the door.

The pile of clothes and blankets jumped slightly at the loud sound of the door crashing open.

"Hello?" he said softly. Whatever was alive under there, he didn't want to startle. "Is anyone in there?"

He heard a soft moan from underneath the blanket and made his way over to where the 'pile' was laying on the floor. He gently pulled the blanket back and was startled to see that it was actually Kaylee. Sydney had been right. She was being held in this room.

Kaylee looked at him with wide eyes. She looked like she had been through hell and back. Her body was thinner than normal. The clothes she was wearing were almost completely tattered. Her hair was tangled, and her eyes had large circles underneath them. It looked as if she hadn't slept or eaten in days. Though through all the dishevelment and crazy looks, he could still see the woman he would give his life for underneath it all.

She kept staring at him with those familiar eyes, wide and innocent, as she scurried back into the corner. She desperately grasped at the floor to push herself as far away from him as she could.

"Get out of here," she screamed. She flailed her arms up over her face, trying to block him from her line of sight.

"Kaylee, I'm not leaving without you," Sark answered. He began to move towards her but was silenced when she screamed forcefully. "Would you keep it down? I don't want any armed guards barreling in on us."

"You are just a hallucination. You're not real. You're not real. You're not real. You're not real." Kaylee kept repeating those same three words as she curled in the fetal position, wrapped her arms around her bent knees, and began rocking somewhat.

"It's me, Kaylee. I am real." Sark stretched his arm out towards her. "I've come to take you home."

"No. I let myself believe you'd come for me once. You died on me then. You didn't come and save me from the CIA. You're not going to come now either. You are just a hallucination of my mind. You're not really here. Go away. I have enough to deal with already."

"I am here, and you do need me to stay with you. Just as much as I need you to come back to me and stay with me," Sark said. He knew that he had to get the both of them out of the building rather quickly. Which was why he found himself getting frustrated with the woman he loved. "If you would just let me get close enough to touch you, you could see I was real."

"It's another one of Rambaldi's tricks. It always is. Whenever I get an ounce of happiness, something comes up from his life's work that takes it all away. That man is ruining my life from his grave."

"Rambaldi's prophecies won't amount to anything if you refuse to let them happen. You're strong. You can take your life in whatever direction you want. Come with me now. You'll keep it from happening if you just come with me now." He held out his hand to her again.

"Who are you really?" she asked. She got up from her crouching position against the wall and slowly walked to where he was standing. Making a continuous circle around his position, she kept poking him every once in a while. Finally she came to a rest and put her hand into his outstretched one.


"So now you believe I'm real?" he asked. He could see that she was gaining her wits a little. The progress made him want to scream for joy. He was starting to lose faith that he had what it would take to bring her back.


"I believe you're real. But I can't let you take me away from here, Andrew."

"The Covenant really did a number on you."

Kaylee sighed and sat down on the mattress-less bed. "I've only been here for two weeks. In that two weeks, they've destroyed everything I know. Everything about me. They only feed me twice. The one time I feel asleep, they came in and tried to perform tests on me. I haven't slept since then. They've poked around in my head every single time I was too weak to fend them off. I don't know what they've done exactly. All I know is that it scared me to death. They've told me everything they could think of to make me crack. I don't know why they're doing all of this. All I know is I can't escape the hold they have on me. It still scares me to death a little. But knowing what is to come helps that."

"You can escape the hold they have on you," Sark said as he sat down next to her on the bed. "We escaped it once together, didn't we?"

"What we had in Newcastle never would have lasted. It didn't last. We can't get that back."


"We can get that back as long as you agreed to come leave this facility with me."

"We can't get it back," she said forcefully.

"Fine. If we can't get that specific moment back, then we can build a new life. A life that makes us just as happy."

"I can't do that. If I do, the Covenant will just find me again and drag me back here. Besides, I have a job to do."

"And what job is that?" Sark really didn't want to humor the futile conversation they were having, but he honestly didn't know what else to do.

"Haven't you heard the prophecy? I'm supposed to be betrayed by everyone I know including the man I loved the most. That came true. Everyone I knew either betrayed me or got ripped out of my life."

Sark knew what she said was partially true. He had let her down at the moment she needed him the most. He would give up his whole world, even his life, to take that moment of stupidity back. As much as it hurt him, he cut her off. "Will Tippin never betrayed you."

Kaylee ignored his comment. "I'm in the downward spiral that Rambaldi predicated for the woman in the prophecy. My job is to die, Andrew. It's the only thing I was ever meant to do."

"Your mother spent her whole life trying to prove to you that that very thing wasn't true."

"I'm willing to believe that she tried. But there's no way she could succeed. I have a destiny. An unshakable fate. I can't get away from it, no matter how hard I try."

"So you're just willing to wait here until the Covenant finally kills you?"

"No," she said with a laugh that made Sark shudder. "That's the beauty of it. I don't have to wait until they're ready. That's why you're here. That's the whole point of you showing up at this moment in time."

"I don't understand."

"Before you got here, I wasn't sure I had the strength to do what needed to be done. But now that you're here, I know I can do it. You taught me the true meaning of strength. It's my fate and my job. You're here to help me finish that job." With a surprisingly quick motion, Kaylee reached over and pulled out the gun that was in Sark's pocket. "You brought me the only present I've ever really needed. I just have to push the trigger and this will all be over."

Sark came back to his senses as he saw Kaylee lift the gun up to her head. He flung his hand out and knocked the gun out of her head. But not before it let out one shot.

Kaylee looked down at her body and was shocked to see no blood staining her tattered clothing. "Why did you do that?" she hissed at Sark. He was ruining everything she had spent the past two weeks dreaming up.

"Because I'm not going to let you die." Sark looked down at where the bullet had grazed his side. It wasn't bad enough that his back was in constant pain, but now he had a searing pain in his side. The pain didn't even matter to him that much. He would rather have the burden of it than see Kaylee dying before his eyes. Besides, it was a constant reminder to him that he was still alive. Pain was good.

"You are not going to let Rambaldi win," he said. "That man didn't know what havoc his predications would cause in your life when he made them hundreds of years ago. He was a good man, and I don't think he would have liked the way you wanted this whole thing to turn out."

"So you just want me to sit here and wait until the Covenant kills me?" Kaylee was confused as to what he was trying to get at. She had thought he had come here to help her end the pain, but instead he was just causing her more pain.

"No, I want you to come with me. I need you by my side, Kaylee." Sark walked over to where Kaylee was still sitting on the bed. He kneeled down in front of her.

"No. You have my mother. You'll be fine without me." She smiled at him faintly.

"I don't want your bloody mother. I want you. Since the first day I met you, I think you've been the only thing I've ever wanted. And even before that, I think I always had the idea of you in my head. You're what I've been searching for. I just want to take you away from here and show you that we can be happy together again."

"The Covenant won't let that happen. They'll come after me."

"Let them," he said determinately. He grabbed her hand and looked into her eyes. "I will never let anyone hurt you if I can help it. I love you."

"And I love you. But that's not strong enough to save me."

"Then you really don't know how much I love you." Sark squeezed her hand. "I asked you once if you'd rather find the one you're meant to be with and die the next day or live without them for the next fifty years. I wanted to let you know that I would have said the same thing. I would rather die than know a life without you by my side."

"Don't," Kaylee said as she jerked her hand back from his. "Don't make me choose between you and the fate I know is mine."

"I'm not going to make you choose." Sark grabbed her hand again. Whatever he did, he knew that it was important to keep touching her somehow. The connection between them made her sound a little more coherent and a lot less crazy. "You don't have a choice. You're coming with me if I have to drag you out of here. I will not let you surrender to death. I will not spend the rest of my life without you."

Kaylee smiled at him again. "You'll adjust. I've adjusted to the knowledge that I'm going to die. I have to die for everything to be set right."

"Screw Rambaldi and his damn prophecy!" Sark screamed as he stood up. "You're not going to die for that moronic cause." He took a deep breath and started over a little more calm. "I need you. Our son needs you."

"Our son?" Kaylee looked over at him with tears in her eyes. Sark let a smile pass onto his lips as he saw something click somewhere in her head. This was the key to convincing her to let go. "You know about Grayson?"

"Sydney told me. I had a right to know that I had a son." He smiled at her. "Kaylee, I want you and I to leave this place. I want to go back to Newcastle with you. I want to have the life back that we had there once. I want to raise our son with you, out of the CIA and the Covenant and Rambaldi's clutches. Just you, me, and our son."

"I want all of that, too." Sark's heart broke as he watch Kaylee's body wrench with sobs. "God, how I want all of that. But I don't have the strength to leave this place. It's too hard. I don't have it in me. I can't walk away from this."

"Then, I'll carry you." Sark scooped her up into his arms. "You just rest. I'll take care of everything from now on."

Kaylee leaned her head onto Sark's shoulder and finally let herself surrender to the sleep she had been denied for days. She felt safe again for the first time in two and a half years.