Title: Chronic Vertigo
Author: Kira [kira at sd-1 dot com]
Genre: Romance/Action/Adventure
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: We all know the drill. I don't own Alias, so please don't sue me. I'm already in debt. And even if you did sue me, it would come off my credit card and I'd still be in debt. So, right. You're better off leaving me be.

Chapter Four\\ Ipse Dixit
Part A

"I do not believe in a fate that falls on men however they act; but I do believe in a fate that falls on them unless they act."
G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936)


"The transmitter went active twenty minutes ago," Jack said, giving Weiss and Vaughn only a small glare as they snuck in the back of the conference room and took seats like guilty late college students. They looked around guiltily, Vaughn smoothing out his tie subconsciously. His eyes locked with Sydney's and stayed there as she tried to see what was going on with him. He broke contact after a moment, the feeling of someone trying to read into him making him uncomfortable. She crossed her arms and turned to her father, leaving Vaughn to look up at the older agent himself.

"We can assume we only have a few hours before the device becomes unreliable," he continued. Marshall shifted in his seat and moved his hand as if he were about to say something in his creation's defense, but a sharp look from Jack silenced him before he even spoke. True, the device was good, but the tech didn't have the infield experience to know the errors that occurred in the field. Things happened out there that could alter the tracker's performance - movement, action, a variety of things. A few reliable hours was a high estimate, but a realistically optimistic one.

"Currently, Sark is here." The button for the computer was clicked again, the whir of the computer behind the images filling the stark silent room. "An airport in Paris. We think he's simple connecting to a trans-Atlantic fight and are working on the passenger manifests for the airport now." Kendall moved over, wanting to claim back his territory over the briefing but not being able to stand up to Jack. He stood to the side, silent and unmoving. It took a second for him to move in, to show he was still here for a reason.

"Agents Bristow and Vaughn, you'll be meeting up with Mr. Sark as soon as he lands. We're hoping the passenger manifests will allow us to make that happen. The objective is to bring him into custody as smoothly as possible. We're vying for the element of surprise to be on our side," he explained. Sydney sighed. It was never easy going on a mission, but with a window that could be as small as a few minutes, it would be harder. She'd joked before about keeping a packed suitcase in her trunk for those just in case moments. Now it was going to become something more than a joke.

"What if we can't find out where Sark's heading?" Vaughn brought up, a pen balanced between two of the fingers on his right hand. A slight smile came to Sydney's face, but faded as her eyes caught on the slowly fading scar on his palm, some of the skin still pink after these months. The pen moved in between his fingers as his mind worked gracefully with the practice only years of passing his father's coin through his fingers could bring. "Sark's smart enough to disguise himself, use an alias."

"We can see where he is, Agent Vaughn. It is a simple matter of seeing what flight leaves when he does."

Vaughn leaned back in his chair, the pen still between his fingers, satisfied with the answer.

"So we get to the airport before him and apprehend him as soon as he gets off the plane," Sydney stated more than asked. "Why does this sound too easy?"

"Because it is?" Vaughn suggested, raising his brow, a hint of laughter in his words. The smile was contagious only to Sydney, the younger agents still remembering how to smile, to laugh, to bring humor to these lives of theirs.

"You leave as soon as we know the destination," Kendall said briskly. The computer's whir died down as the hard disk did the same.

"He's not going to be taken without a fight," Sydney announced to the room.

"Then fight him," Kendall said nonchalantly. She closed her eyes momentarily, taking a breath. Easy for him to say - he didn't just get back from fighting him.

. .

"Got 'em." If the tech was nervous because Weiss had been standing looking over his shoulder for the last 20 minutes, he was doing an awesome job of hiding it. Only once in that time period had he glanced over his shoulder, and that was because Weiss' yo-yo had hit the back of his chair, breaking his concentration on the screen before him.

But when he said 'got 'em', he keyed in a few commands and the flight plans and passenger manifests the other agents had been compiling flew to his screen. By comparing the location of the terminal with the data, the tech smiled and relaxed in his chair, having found the plane and destination.

"Bogotá, Columbia. Should be there in 17 hours," he announced after a few seconds of compiling the data. Weiss nodded more to himself than to anyone else, and reached around the tech to the phone and punched in the number for op prep.

"Op Prep."

"This is Agent Weiss," he said quickly. If they left now, the CIA would have a 10 hour head start over Sark - more than enough time. "Are Agents Vaughn or Bristow there?"

"Hold on," and he could hear the sounds of the phone being handed around the room. He waited impatiently - there were more calls to be made, and this one was certainly not on the top of his list. This was a prime example of the kinds of things he did for his friends.

"Weiss?" Sydney's soft voice came through. He was caught off-guard for a second, not used to having her answer when he called for the pair. Oh God, were they now as attached by the hip in his mind as they were in real life? Were they becoming one of *those* couples?! Weiss made a mental note to save his friend later as the girlfriend continued to speak in his ear. "What is it?"

"Bogotá. Bring a suit, I'm sure Mike'll like it," he grinned. The phone was such a wonderful invention, and was, at the moment, the only thing between him and a painful smack in the arm.

"I'm hoping I won't be there long enough to use it," Sydney sighed. Her fatigue, her tiredness over this job was evident in her voice at that point, having let her guard down for that one second. "What's our advantage?" And like that, she was back to all business.

"If you leave now, 10 hours."

"Good, I've been needing a break - maybe I can get one after this."

"So I hear," he muttered and slid under the radar. "Where's Mike?"

"Up with Marshall, why?" she asked, her voice slightly distance as she cradled the phone between her head and shoulder. She grabbed the clipboard Nancy, the secretary in Op Tech, handed her and signed quickly for the mission's supplies, giving Nancy the flash of a smile before turning her back to her.

"You left him alone with [i]Marshall[/i]?" Weiss asked, puzzled. He turned to look around the large, open room for any signs of Vaughn, but found his view obstructed by the small group gathered around the tech whose phone he was borrowing. A little self-conscious, he moved as far from them as the phone cord would allow.

"Yeah?"

"Sydney," he said into the phone with an uncharacteristically hushed tone. "Marshall rambles, and often blurts things out *accidentally* when he - "

The phone line went dead. Weiss held the phone out at arm's length and frowned.

"Why do they always do that?" he asked himself. Was it too hard for them to shout a quick goodbye?

. .

She was out of breath by the time she arrived at Marshall's station. It only took her a few seconds to regain herself, a time she used to take in the scene. Marshall was sitting in his rolling chair, turned to face Vaughn who was perched on the stool at the edge of the station. They were laughing, smiles stretched across their features. This caused her to grin as well. Vaughn's smiles - real, full smiles - were rarer these days as his mind was constantly occupied.

He was struggling, forcing himself to remember this data stored in his head, pulling up memories and analyzing them. He never said anything, though, just kept it all inside like always, but she heard him late at night, tossing and turning only to awaken angry. Angry at his father for doing this - for using him in such a way without clear explanation or reason. It would soon fade into manufactured understanding, then to disappointment in himself. That was the point he reached before getting up and leaving her side only to return some time later.

So, with a smile on her own face, she approached.

"Hey, Syd!" Vaughn greeted, somewhat more jubilant than earlier that morning. She crossed her arms and took an assertive step forwards, standing just inside the edge of Marshall's station that was quickly becoming cluttered. She could imagine the day when Kendall walked by only to trip over a blow up chair or odd invention of the week. Marshall was certainly a man who was in need of an office if there ever was one.

"Hi, umm, Sydney," Marshall started, but Vaughn motioned toward him as he started to speak to Sydney.

"Since this is just a simple retrieval mission, Marshall doesn't have anything for us," he said. "But, he does have a few good jokes. Tell her that last one you told me, Marshall." He had turned his attention back to the tech, oblivious to the almost envious look reflected in Marshall's eyes. He smiled, albeit tentatively, before switching over to the joke he'd told moments before.

But Sydney's attention wasn't on the joke. Her eyes were distant, reading the windows flashing on Marshall's monitor. Her head moved to the side as she tried to examine it closer from her vantage point, unwilling to take even one step from Vaughn's side - she couldn't bring herself to leave when he was this happy, this - normal? Was that what this was? He was a normal man at that moment, enjoying jokes with his coworkers; not a man struggling on a daily basis with a past he didn't choose, and a present he wanted nothing to do with. He was mentally preparing for a battle he once again felt he must face alone. Did he not learn from his past mistakes?

They were laughing around her. At first, it was soft, but gradually climaxed into full volume. The blinking on the monitor was gone, leaving only a simple wallpaper stretched across the enormous flat-screen. She shook her head and returned her attention to the two men standing a few feet from her. Both were looking at her oddly.

"Did you even hear a word he said?" Vaughn asked, pushing off the stool.

"Sorry, Marshall. I saw something flashing on your screen."

"Oh, you did? Well, that could be any number of things. I have a game running, and you know - or maybe you don't know, but sometimes someone sends a message or something and it flashes and - "

"Can you just check it for me? It would make me feel better," Sydney said, almost hugging herself. Marshall opened his mouth a bit to say something, but a sharp look from Vaughn made him stop, pout a bit, and turn to lean over his screen. Sydney sighed - she hated when Marshall was brushed aside in anger or annoyance. He was such a sweet, gentle person caught up in this world of lies and madness. What she wouldn't give to be back there in time when he was recruited and make it so he never was.

"Looks like a glitch in the tracker, which is odd, because, well, there shouldn't be one - I'm going to have to fix that for next time. But it looks okay and everything. Did you, umm, find out where you're going?" At this point, he hit his forehead in frustration with his own mistake. "Bogotá, right, I knew that. Columbia. Is it safe to go there, because I heard on the news - well, actually my, umm, mom did and told me, but it's dangerous, right?"

"We'll be fine," Sydney laughed. Everything was okay, nothing had been said about what was -

"Oh, you know, I was wondering - and I'm sure you were too, but why would Sark be going there? So I was cross-referencing files and such and well, came upon the one I gave you and bingo! found it."

Sydney groaned. Vaughn raised an eyebrow and put a hand on the desktop to his right.

"What file?" he inquired in a cool, even voice. Marshall was a deer in headlights, or, in this case, in the high beams of two cold green eyes.

Sydney swooped in to save him. "What did you find out about the location?"

"Well, ummm," he started up nervously, "that was the last location I tracked that, umm, computer to."

"I can't *believe* this!" Vaughn exclaimed, his hand rising only to slam down on the desktop it had been resting on. Marshall backed away ever so slightly.

"Vaughn," Sydney started, reaching a had out. He swatted it away with a single precise movement of his left arm.

"You were researching this behind my back," Vaughn bit out. His eyes were still straight ahead, focused on the clock over Marshall's right shoulder. 1:15 pm. They had to leave soon, if they were going to pull this off correctly.

"I just wanted to help! You've been torturing yourself for months," defended Sydney. He tore his eyes from the clock as if there were an actual string connecting his gaze to the wall-mounted device. "Just, just try to understand me, Vaughn. I just wanted to help you."

"I don't need your help!" he roared. Movement stopped, eyes turned. Vaughn, however, didn't comply with the rest of them, and swept out of Marshall's area with aged grace she hadn't seen on him before. It surprised her, as did many things about him. She thought of the other file, the one she'd had copied so many months ago but hadn't the heart to read. Maybe now was a good time to start.

--

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said anything. I mean, I didn't know he was going to get so upset and such and he really kinda scared me there - "

"It's alright," Sydney sighed, watching Vaughn walk farther and farther from her field of vision. The hum and background noise of the large open room returned with every step farther he took, until finally he was gone. "We'd better tell my father - he'll want to know this."

"Actually, umm, could you maybe tell him?" Marshall asked of her, twisting his clasped hands in a way that couldn't be comfortable. They twisted nervously as he scrunched up his face.

"Sure, Marshall, I'll tell him."

. .

[b]Bogotá, Columbia[/b]

One of the most insanely difficult activities in the life of a spy was jetting off on a mission in which cooperation was required when your partner wanted nothing more than to see you smashed down into small pieces.

Sydney thought for a moment, the wind playing with the strands of brown hair that had escaped the hold of her ponytail holder as she stood at the edge of the doors of the old airplane hanger. She was sure Vaughn didn't want to see her in small pieces, nor did he want to see her dead at his own hands. But if the last 10 hours had been a sign of anything, it was that he was mad with her, for what she thought, were purely selfish reasons. Not a word had been spoken, and when she brought up the mission objectives for a final review, he'd simple slipped on the headphones provided and watched the end of the in-flight movie. Seeing that he'd rather watch a chick-flick than speak to her had been enough, and she went over everything on her own.

He stood now, stoic, at least 10 feet from her, leaning on a crate in the corner near an airport attendant practicing his Spanish. Every so often he'd fumble over his words, maybe mispronouncing one or two parts. It was obvious not only to her, but the man he was speaking to that he hadn't spoken Spanish in a long time, having always relied on those around him, those in the field while he stood in that operations system. He was and always would be a desk man no matter how many times he ran out into the field with her, anyone could tell that of him after 10 minutes around him here. Or anywhere. But yet he continued, pushing himself as if he needed to prove himself with each passing day, that nothing he did was good enough. But for who?

She sighed, frustrated with the current situation, a situation she herself got into without help from anyone else, and placed a hand on the old, rusted metal of the large hanger door before leaning out ever so slightly to check once again if the plane had arrived. A blast of hot air hit her square in the face, causing her to squish it up ever so slightly, blinking a few times before he eyes were used to the lighting change. In the distance, she could see the trees laid out at the edge of the terminals swaying the in the breeze, their simple beauty lost on the airport employees running back and forth on the ground near her. The wind shifted a bit, her pony tail shifting in the wind. Sydney turned.

The man sat on a crate alone.

"Shouldn't be much longer now," came Vaughn's soft voice from behind her. She smiled a bit, relived he was actually back to speaking with her, and pivoted on one foot to face him. He stood before her, but didn't see her. She could be sure of that. But for that fleeting moment, she realized his refusal to speak to her before was not an action founded in anger.

Because in that moment she saw her father in him.

Not in the manor of genetics or familiar relations, but of something else. He was cold, yet feeling, in a way she'd only seen her father pull off. Was he on that path, quickly descending until he became her father? But there was only one reason her father was that way.

Protection

Vaughn was *protecting* himself from the world. And she hated it.

"Hey, listen, I'm sorry about - "

"Don't worry about it," he cut her off, his eyes swinging down to gaze at her for just a moment. The returned to the horizon beyond the doorway just as fast as they were on her.

"I am. I'm worried about you. You were always so, so," and she faltered. She actually faltered!

"I know."

"'Oh," she replied. He sighed and shifted slightly, his shoes scuffing the concrete floor.

"I'm not questioning you or what you did," he said slowly, his eyes now focused on his shoes. A hand rose to go through his hair, then to rub the back of his neck. "I just feel that I don't need anyone else to help me deal with things."

"We all need help sometimes, Vaughn."

He smiled, just a tad. "Something I've learned from you."

"Just because you feel you need to protect me, be there for me, it doesn't mean I can't do the same for you."

"Then I guess we'll have to see how it goes, won't we," he said, slightly distracted. With her puzzled look, he pointed outside. A plane was landing, the very one they had been waiting for. She turned to look out at it, watching it land. It was time to get moving. Bringing a hand up to her right ear, she clicked on the com unit in her ear, connecting her to the rest of their team. Her team. And finally, the full impact of failure on herself personally caught up with her. If they let Sark escape now, she didn't know what would happened, but she knew it would be bad.

The plane stopped in the runway, as they'd requested.

"Wait for my signal," Sydney hissed into her earpiece, swearing she could hear the men on the other end shuffle and wake up from whatever naps they were taking. Or not. Trained men wouldn't sleep while on a mission, but then again, Vaughn wouldn't speak a sloppy language to some airport worker either. She pushed such trivial matters out of her mind, focusing into the zone she placed herself in when on a mission. All her mind worried about was her objective - and that was Sark, who could now be seen disembarking the plane with all the other confused passengers. She lowered the pair of binoculars she'd been looking through from her dark eyes only to have them snatched from her as Vaughn took his turn.

She wasn't going to wait for him to finish looking out.

"Move in. Target is wearing dark black suit with blue tie, sunglasses, blond hair," she shouted into her earpiece, thrusting the large metal door open and rushing out into the bright sunlight. Vaughn could be heard yelling something behind her, but it didn't matter as she rushed, flanked by 10 men in black with automatic weapons. Vaughn's footsteps could be heard rapidly approaching from behind her, the binoculars bobbing up and down in his right hand as he kept his left free.

The cries of the innocent passengers reached them before everyone was clear to them, crying out in surprise and confusion, spinning to face their nameless companions in search of some kind of validation. That what they were seeing was really happening. The cries, in both English and Spanish, were nothing but ambient noise to the trained agents, who swept up into the crowd, searching for their mark. Wildly spinning around, guns threatening to hit those foolish enough to get in their way, the team scanned the scene. Where was he?

"Sark!" Vaughn cried, the blond man catching his eye as he ran off towards the terminals. He took off himself, followed closely by Sydney and those members of the team who had heard his outburst. All the anger he felt from earlier, the hurt, the sense of betrayal, everything came bursting to the surface, his face twisting into an unrecognizable mask as he felt a burst of speed. Running, to him, was always the best method of release, the best way to forget everything that happened in the days or hours before. Yet now he had nothing on his mind, and relied on instinct as he ran.

Sark spied him from over his right shoulder, his suit coat flying out behind him as he ran. He knew he had to loose the agents following him if he were to get out of here in once piece - get out of here free. They neared the maintenance area, thick with orange suited personnel in oversized headsets, half to engrossed in their tasks to notice the chaise occurring around them. Sark pushed one with a large tool, sending him off balance and finally, over. Vaughn jumped over him flawlessly while Sydney mumbled an apology to him as she passed him by.

By now, Vaughn had taken out his gun, pointing it with one hand as he still gripped the binoculars in the other with a white-knuckled grip. They swayed with his arm, the other straight in front of him as he ran, his mind focused on catching Sark and nothing else. Though he wasn't the one with the personal vendetta against the man as Sydney was, nor did he ever care to catch the international hit man more than his patriotic sense of morality was concerned. So why was he chasing Sark down a rapidly narrowing pathway that could only end in dimly lit service corridors or overcrowded terminal walkways.

He hoped for the former and kept running.

A rapidly approaching luggage "train" snaked its way around the smaller area, the driver intent on reaching a soon-departing train and not worried about a horde of armed men rushing the stage. Sark took this opportunity to surprise the driver and cause the train to stop, giving him the chance to unbuckle the bags and allow them to tumble out in the direction of his chasers. The driver, who now was responsible to clean up this mess, shouted at Sark in Spanish as he continued off, hoping this small momentary action might buy him enough time to escape. He had a large feeling that this whole chase had to do with the CIA's ingenious idea of planting a bug on him and their uncanny knack of turning up precisely where he didn't want nor need them. A kink in his plan, but a fixable situation none the less.

The luggage lost them some of the following members of the team, as well as the over-enthusiastic leader, Vaughn, who, despite his graceful vaulting over several pieces of luggage caught a foot on a particularly large suitcase and fell forward, thankful for the other assorted pieces lying around to cushion his fall. Sydney paused, her mind on him instead of their prisoner-to-be. She bent down to meet him, but he pushed her away, using the larger pieces to pull himself up.

"Don't loose him!" he hissed through clenched teeth, wavering on his feet for a second as a wave of pain pulsated through his right ankle. Sydney wavered herself, but rushed off as his eyes, a piercing cold green, commanded her to do so. The team followed, passing him as if he were the slow kid on a long distance run in high school. He swore and tested it out carefully, finding the pain in his ankle small when compared to the pain that had been weighing down his heart for the last four months - and if he could get through day to day life with that, he could continue running. Leaning forward for extra momentum, he sprung from his position and followed along. He couldn't be that far behind everyone else - could he be?

A gunshot echoed through the air, but didn't phase the natives, who continued on with their work. Apprehension gripped Vaughn's already stressed heart, and he moved quicker.

He came upon Sark, backed against a wall, and Sydney, standing across from him, holding out her gun, a bullet hole in the wall next to Sark's head. Smoke continued to rise from it as Sark stood stationary, Sydney and several armed men standing around him. Vaughn came to a stop just behind Sydney, his eyes still as cold as they'd been before. His weight was on his good ankle, the pain from the other slowly seeping up his leg.

"Well, we meet again, Agent Bristow," Sark commented coolly. Almost too coolly for Sydney's taste, considering his current situation. "Thought you made sure we would meet again. Very clever."

"Why, thanks," she retorted sarcastically. Sark kept eye contact with her, his fingers inching down the side of his other arm in an outwardly casual manor. A distraction, no matter what size, was all he needed. "Put your hands above your head, Sark, because I won't miss next time."

"And here I thought it was your shoddy marksmanship skills that made you miss," he responded, bating her. Vaughn hung his head - she'd taken it, he could tell by her changed posture, how the grip on her gun increased. She moved to take a step forward, but Sark had reached the item inside his sleeve; a dagger.

The blond-haired man moved with an unknown grace, twisting to his left and jumping a bit, gaining the leverage he required to plunge the dagger into the man standing there. A cried escaped the dying man's lips, prompting his teammates to open fire - but the man was simply used as a shield as Sark ducked behind an incoming trolley. The gunfire hit the metal like hale descending from the sky, and continued as the trolley moved along.

Sark was no longer behind it.

Sydney whipped her head around - looking at the scene from every angle, but failed to locate her target. She ran, ran in the direction she believed him to have gone in, but found nothing as she continued down the corridor between to large arms of the airport, terminals and planes moving on either side. It was darker down here, colder. A pungent smell assaulted her senses, causing her to shift, her movement segmented.

A dead end.

She stopped, her head going towards the blue sky, wishing for a bit of sun down where she was. She'd failed. He had been right there, right there! And she had let him go. Not only that, but one of the men with her would return home in a casket, to be shown to his family as they struggled to remain emotionless in the face of death.

"Where are you!" she screamed, her hands moving with her emotion. The gun she held waved in her hand, threatening to kill the birds perched nearby. "Where. Are. You!" She screamed again, frustrated with herself, with her failure. What would happen now?

Vaughn came up behind her, his arms wrapping around her shoulders from behind, protocol be dammed. The gun fell from her side, clanking on the cement ground below her. She leaned back into him, only to be pushed away, forward. She turned, confused, but saw him favoring his ankle, an odd grin on his face.

Is this what the life had become? Could you attach yourself to someone only to have the attachment to revenge, to retribution, overtake that love? And if she felt that only to a smaller degree with Sark and Slone, what was happening in his mind?