Chapter 30
"Julia Thorne was what?!"
"Sydney, you were activated the past two years...in your Project Christmas identity," Jack admitted, face ashen.
Sydney snatched her hand away and backed away from him, horrified. "But why...why would you do that?" she asked, voice breaking. "Why would you do that to *me*?"
"I didn't, Sydney. I give you my word," said Jack desperately. "And I would have sworn it wasn't possible."
"You mean everything that happened...the people I murdered...the slime that I slept with. . . losing Vaughn...was because of some bizarre psych experiment you ran on me when I was a child?" Sydney's voice began to rise.
"Sydney, it was never meant to turn out like this. I did it because I feared I might lose you," Jack pleaded, praying for understanding.
"Lose me? LOSE ME?" she shouted. "This was all about YOU? Do you have any idea what I'VE lost?" Her chest heaved.
"Sydney, I -,"
"How long have you known?" Her voice, loud earlier, had suddenly become deadly soft. "How. long?" she hissed.
Jack swallowed. "Two months."
"You b*stard." Sydney's open palm flew threw the air. Jack saw it coming and waited as it hit his face with a loud crack. "All that time. . . all that time we were working together, and I was *so* grateful," her voice caught in a sob, "grateful that my father was there, and that there was someone that I could trust, who loved me. . . and it was all a lie. You were trying to cover up what you'd done."
"No."
"No?" she challenged incredulously. "Do you expect me to believe -,"
"Yes, I tried to cover up what I'd done. I was. . . devastated that I had caused you so much heartache. But Sydney, my love for you was real. The things I did were because I was afraid I would lose your love."
"And now?"
"I still love you. And I'm still afraid." Jack looked at her steadily.
"Jack Bristow? Afraid?" sneered Sydney out of reflex.
"I've never been so terrified in my life," he replied, eyes flickering as an expression of vulnerability flashed across his face. "I've lied to you for so long - about your mother, about Project Christmas, about what I did for a living - I don't know if you can love me without the lies. Now that you know the truth."
"And if I can't?" asked Sydney somberly.
Jack closed his eyes for a moment, trying to maintain control. "I understand," he said quietly, "better than most that there is a point of no return. Where trust. . . and love. . . are no longer possible. And I accept that I may have crossed that line. As your mother has crossed it with me. But please let me help you find out why this was done to you."
Sydney turned away from him, staring out over the water as tears streamed down her face. "I need some time. To think."
Jack nodded, drained. "I'll walk you back to your car."
"Fine," came the subdued response.
**
Arvin Sloane sipped his cognac contemplatively. Reports placed Jack and Sydney Bristow back in LA. Sydney, he knew, had not yet located the third item that Julia had hidden before losing her memories, but he was confident that she would do so. Julia would not have left something like that to chance. He wondered, for the thousandth time, why she had chosen to hide the artifacts instead of delivering them directly to him. Had she believed she was being watched? Had she known that Irina was planning to deactivate her?
He shrugged. She'd be able to tell him as soon as she was reactivated. It shouldn't be much longer. For while Irina appeared to have slipped through Jack's fingers, Jack was nothing if not tenacious. Particularly in this case. He wondered what Jack was planning next.
**
Jack sat on his couch, staring despondently at the far wall. He had been sitting in the same spot for almost two hours; there didn't seem to be any reason to move. A banging on his front door caused him to wrench himself away from the futile second-guessing of his life in which he had been engaged. Listlessly he made his way to the front hall and pulled the door open.
"Hi."
Jack looked out onto his front porch, where Sydney stood holding two bags. "Hi."
"Can I come in?"
"Sure." Jack stepped back and let Sydney enter. The unmistakable aroma of Chinese food filtered up from one of the bags.
"You won," said Sydney evenly. "I bought dinner."
As she moved into the light, Jack saw that her face was puffy, her eyes reddened. Probably not too dissimilar from his own. "You didn't have to."
"I know."
Silently they unpacked. Sydney offered her father a beer from the second bag. "No thanks. I'm fine." Sydney followed her father's eyes to the bottle of scotch on the counter, all but empty.
"I have questions," she said briefly.
"Anything." He gestured at two chairs and they sat, each pretending to eat their food.
"If you didn't activate me, who did?" Sydney began.
Jack sighed. Would it ever be easy? "All evidence points towards. . . your mother," he said gently.
"Mom?" repeated Sydney, her face falling. "Mom did that to me?"
"Knife skills, assassin conditioning. They were part of the Russian Project Christmas. And, as you know," he said with an edge to his voice, "there is little she didn't know about the project and its protocols. You must have been conditioned from an early age."
"I don't believe you," said Sydney flatly. "Mom wouldn't have done this to me."
"Sydney, we're talking about the woman who abandoned you when you were six. Shot you in the shoulder. Knocked you out with a hockey stick. Tasered you. She is a master at manipulating feelings. Yours. . . .mine. She was in LA the night you disappeared. And the last words she said to you were 'You are the chosen one'."
"But. . . then why has she been helping me?"
"She needs us for something. I don't know what, but I suspect we'll find out once we follow that third clue."
Sydney sat in silence for a moment, looking miserable. Jack wondered if she was wishing she'd been an orphan.
"But you said it wasn't possible," she protested weakly. "For me to be activated."
"I didn't think it was. Activation requires a particular sequence of words. No one, *no one*, knew that sequence besides me. I would never have voluntarily shared it. Certainly not with Irina Derevko. And she would not have had the opportunity to. . . ," his voice caught in his throat.
Sydney watched him, puzzled.
"Panama," Jack said with loathing. "God, what an idiot I've been. It must have been sometime that night." He felt nauseous. How long had he slept that night? Two hours? Three? Had that been enough time for her to extract the trigger phrase from him?
"Dad?" Sydney watched the shifting expressions on her father's face.
"Forget I mentioned it. Please."
"Okaaaay."
"When I said I'll tell you anything, I'd like to still occasionally filter. Things between your mother and me."
"Fine," said Sydney hurriedly. She bit her lip. "I have one last question."
"Yes?"
"Why did you tell me?"
Jack hesitated, knowing that his answer was important. "I realized that I was doing to you what your mother had done to me," he said softly. "Your love for me was based on lies. It was. . . wrong. And cruel. And every additional day that you lived that lie was worse."
"You think about that a lot lately, what Mom did to you, don't you?"
"It's provided me a useful perspective on the relationship you and I have together. And what I am, and am not, willing to put you through. I was a coward, Sydney. I should have told you as soon as I knew, even if it made me the worst father on the planet. I'm sorry."
Sydney reached over and squeezed his hand. "Not the planet, surely," she murmured.
Jack looked down at the hand holding his and swallowed. "The continent?"
Sydney leaned over and kissed him tenderly on the cheek. "Let's take it a step at a time, shall we?"
**
"Sound check."
"I hear you fine, Dad."
Jack scanned the cameras in front of him in the van. "All clear here. Be careful sweetheart. I love you." He held his breath.
Sydney adjusted the veil over her face and bent forward, affecting the gait of a woman three times her age. In her shapeless black dress and clunky shoes, she was just another widow filing into the church for evening prayers.
"I love you too, Dad."
"Julia Thorne was what?!"
"Sydney, you were activated the past two years...in your Project Christmas identity," Jack admitted, face ashen.
Sydney snatched her hand away and backed away from him, horrified. "But why...why would you do that?" she asked, voice breaking. "Why would you do that to *me*?"
"I didn't, Sydney. I give you my word," said Jack desperately. "And I would have sworn it wasn't possible."
"You mean everything that happened...the people I murdered...the slime that I slept with. . . losing Vaughn...was because of some bizarre psych experiment you ran on me when I was a child?" Sydney's voice began to rise.
"Sydney, it was never meant to turn out like this. I did it because I feared I might lose you," Jack pleaded, praying for understanding.
"Lose me? LOSE ME?" she shouted. "This was all about YOU? Do you have any idea what I'VE lost?" Her chest heaved.
"Sydney, I -,"
"How long have you known?" Her voice, loud earlier, had suddenly become deadly soft. "How. long?" she hissed.
Jack swallowed. "Two months."
"You b*stard." Sydney's open palm flew threw the air. Jack saw it coming and waited as it hit his face with a loud crack. "All that time. . . all that time we were working together, and I was *so* grateful," her voice caught in a sob, "grateful that my father was there, and that there was someone that I could trust, who loved me. . . and it was all a lie. You were trying to cover up what you'd done."
"No."
"No?" she challenged incredulously. "Do you expect me to believe -,"
"Yes, I tried to cover up what I'd done. I was. . . devastated that I had caused you so much heartache. But Sydney, my love for you was real. The things I did were because I was afraid I would lose your love."
"And now?"
"I still love you. And I'm still afraid." Jack looked at her steadily.
"Jack Bristow? Afraid?" sneered Sydney out of reflex.
"I've never been so terrified in my life," he replied, eyes flickering as an expression of vulnerability flashed across his face. "I've lied to you for so long - about your mother, about Project Christmas, about what I did for a living - I don't know if you can love me without the lies. Now that you know the truth."
"And if I can't?" asked Sydney somberly.
Jack closed his eyes for a moment, trying to maintain control. "I understand," he said quietly, "better than most that there is a point of no return. Where trust. . . and love. . . are no longer possible. And I accept that I may have crossed that line. As your mother has crossed it with me. But please let me help you find out why this was done to you."
Sydney turned away from him, staring out over the water as tears streamed down her face. "I need some time. To think."
Jack nodded, drained. "I'll walk you back to your car."
"Fine," came the subdued response.
**
Arvin Sloane sipped his cognac contemplatively. Reports placed Jack and Sydney Bristow back in LA. Sydney, he knew, had not yet located the third item that Julia had hidden before losing her memories, but he was confident that she would do so. Julia would not have left something like that to chance. He wondered, for the thousandth time, why she had chosen to hide the artifacts instead of delivering them directly to him. Had she believed she was being watched? Had she known that Irina was planning to deactivate her?
He shrugged. She'd be able to tell him as soon as she was reactivated. It shouldn't be much longer. For while Irina appeared to have slipped through Jack's fingers, Jack was nothing if not tenacious. Particularly in this case. He wondered what Jack was planning next.
**
Jack sat on his couch, staring despondently at the far wall. He had been sitting in the same spot for almost two hours; there didn't seem to be any reason to move. A banging on his front door caused him to wrench himself away from the futile second-guessing of his life in which he had been engaged. Listlessly he made his way to the front hall and pulled the door open.
"Hi."
Jack looked out onto his front porch, where Sydney stood holding two bags. "Hi."
"Can I come in?"
"Sure." Jack stepped back and let Sydney enter. The unmistakable aroma of Chinese food filtered up from one of the bags.
"You won," said Sydney evenly. "I bought dinner."
As she moved into the light, Jack saw that her face was puffy, her eyes reddened. Probably not too dissimilar from his own. "You didn't have to."
"I know."
Silently they unpacked. Sydney offered her father a beer from the second bag. "No thanks. I'm fine." Sydney followed her father's eyes to the bottle of scotch on the counter, all but empty.
"I have questions," she said briefly.
"Anything." He gestured at two chairs and they sat, each pretending to eat their food.
"If you didn't activate me, who did?" Sydney began.
Jack sighed. Would it ever be easy? "All evidence points towards. . . your mother," he said gently.
"Mom?" repeated Sydney, her face falling. "Mom did that to me?"
"Knife skills, assassin conditioning. They were part of the Russian Project Christmas. And, as you know," he said with an edge to his voice, "there is little she didn't know about the project and its protocols. You must have been conditioned from an early age."
"I don't believe you," said Sydney flatly. "Mom wouldn't have done this to me."
"Sydney, we're talking about the woman who abandoned you when you were six. Shot you in the shoulder. Knocked you out with a hockey stick. Tasered you. She is a master at manipulating feelings. Yours. . . .mine. She was in LA the night you disappeared. And the last words she said to you were 'You are the chosen one'."
"But. . . then why has she been helping me?"
"She needs us for something. I don't know what, but I suspect we'll find out once we follow that third clue."
Sydney sat in silence for a moment, looking miserable. Jack wondered if she was wishing she'd been an orphan.
"But you said it wasn't possible," she protested weakly. "For me to be activated."
"I didn't think it was. Activation requires a particular sequence of words. No one, *no one*, knew that sequence besides me. I would never have voluntarily shared it. Certainly not with Irina Derevko. And she would not have had the opportunity to. . . ," his voice caught in his throat.
Sydney watched him, puzzled.
"Panama," Jack said with loathing. "God, what an idiot I've been. It must have been sometime that night." He felt nauseous. How long had he slept that night? Two hours? Three? Had that been enough time for her to extract the trigger phrase from him?
"Dad?" Sydney watched the shifting expressions on her father's face.
"Forget I mentioned it. Please."
"Okaaaay."
"When I said I'll tell you anything, I'd like to still occasionally filter. Things between your mother and me."
"Fine," said Sydney hurriedly. She bit her lip. "I have one last question."
"Yes?"
"Why did you tell me?"
Jack hesitated, knowing that his answer was important. "I realized that I was doing to you what your mother had done to me," he said softly. "Your love for me was based on lies. It was. . . wrong. And cruel. And every additional day that you lived that lie was worse."
"You think about that a lot lately, what Mom did to you, don't you?"
"It's provided me a useful perspective on the relationship you and I have together. And what I am, and am not, willing to put you through. I was a coward, Sydney. I should have told you as soon as I knew, even if it made me the worst father on the planet. I'm sorry."
Sydney reached over and squeezed his hand. "Not the planet, surely," she murmured.
Jack looked down at the hand holding his and swallowed. "The continent?"
Sydney leaned over and kissed him tenderly on the cheek. "Let's take it a step at a time, shall we?"
**
"Sound check."
"I hear you fine, Dad."
Jack scanned the cameras in front of him in the van. "All clear here. Be careful sweetheart. I love you." He held his breath.
Sydney adjusted the veil over her face and bent forward, affecting the gait of a woman three times her age. In her shapeless black dress and clunky shoes, she was just another widow filing into the church for evening prayers.
"I love you too, Dad."