Chronic Vertigo
Chapter Four: Catalyst [Part A]
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.
Author's Note: Thanks guys, for your reviews. As soon as I finish my
Christmas fic, this fic will get all my attention and I'll post more often.
That is, if I get more feedback. Feedback = updates. I swear, that's a real
math equation.
The flight returning to LA was even longer than the departing one only a day before, the air no longer thick with anger and a layer of betrayal as it once had been. Instead, uneasiness lingered just over the surface of the air, of unresolved issues. Sadness. The team had departed from their side at the airport, waving with out much emotion - a sign of their general feeling towards their temporary CIA bosses. They were off to the command center just over the border on safer ground, ready to take on their next challenge in the South American heat. Mitchell remained in departing agents' care, silent for the entire flight, not wishing to tempt the coiled snake that was Michael Vaughn.
He sat in an old seat across from the bound Mitchell, feet flat on the floor, arms resting just over a gun settled in his lap. His green eyes sat just above the prisoner's shoulder, but did not sit flat. They flickered just as his face did every so often as his mind relieved the words Mitchell had spat, his once childlike mind once again creating horrid scenarios of his father's last weeks. Resolve, as it had come, was short-lived, his mind once again slipping to where it should not be.
And once again, the key to his very salvation was in the hands of the very one who caused his torment.
Sydney felt the world wasn't fair.
Vaughn also felt the world wasn't fair, but he did feel it was a bit fairer to him than to Sydney.
"You okay?" Sydney finally approached him, the golden beaches of LA visible through the small porthole window. He turned to her, his neck cracking from the sudden movement. He rubbed the back of it absentmindedly, giving her a sheepish grin.
"Fine, yeah, why wouldn't I be?" he asked. "You okay?" She shrugged, annoyed.
"You've been staring at the wall for the entire flight with a gun on your lap," she replied, her tone slightly accusatorial.
"I'm guarding the prisoner," he replied nonchalantly.
"He's bound and we're in a plane, Vaughn. Where do you think he's going to go?" she asked, smiling. His eyes swept over to her subconsciously, working out the kink in his neck. She gave him a half-smile, her eyes concerned, confused.
"He wasn't guarding me," Mitchell finally spoke up, shifting as the plane began it's decent. His shoulders hunched over a bit, his head straining to stay straight, muscles defined as he looked directly at the pair seated across from him. Cold, blazing eyes, full of half-truths and deceit. He rubbed the side of a sleeping leg, his anxiety and dislike of flying clear through his choppy, hesitant mannerisms. Sydney was correct in her statement, Mitchell was certainly uncomfortable being bound to a seat in the aircraft - attacking his captors and jumping out of the plane would be a stretch. Men were known to do things they normally wouldn't do in life or death situations, and yet Mitchell didn't seem to be one.
That, or he *wanted* to get caught, to be brought back to LA.
What kind of deal had Sloane made with this man that would cause him to willingly walk back into the hornet's nest after all these years of running from them? It didn't make sense.
Sydney stared into Mitchell's eyes, praying the answers to her internal inquiry could be found somewhere inside them. She frowned, looking closer. She could have sworn she saw something.
Mitchell closed his eyes and sighed. Sydney looked away.
"I'm sure he wasn't even looking at me the entire time," Mitchell continued. Vaughn's grip on the gun in his lap tightened. "He was thinking."
"Thinking," Sydney retorted somewhat skeptically. Mitchell nodded, opening his mouth to continue his statement, his eyes a hazy mix of trouble she had seen on men numerous times in her line of work. "All right," she continued, leaning forward. "I'll bite. About what?"
"What I said, who I am, ways to off me and not get caught. Things like these often run through the heads of those who meet men like me."
"People's lives were ruined because of what you did, you selfish prick," Vaughn suddenly said, his grip on the gun before him tightening unconsciously. His temper was raised now, his posture rigid and sharp. Sydney felt she'd be cut if she brushed against him.
"No one could see the full consequences of their actions back then. You look at me with the luxury of hindsight."
"Couldn't see the consequences of your actions? Damn it, you basically handed them all over to her!" Vaughn yelled, his voice bouncing off the walls of the small plane. Sydney moved in a hand to comfort him - acting on the principal that mothers could calm their children with a mere touch filled with calmness - but he shoved her hand off his shoulder harshly, moving with more strength than he knew. Her hand flew back at her, almost impaling itself on her rapidly angering face.
"Her? I did not. I was looking out for myself. Self-preservation is - "
"You ruined lives! More than you can count! I knew - I knew some of the others your - " He stopped mid-sentence. For all they knew, he'd come to his senses, realized that there was no use in yelling at a man who did not see the error in his ways. He seemed to relax.
Sydney's arm came out too late, brushing against the edge of his sleeve as he jumped up from his seat, gun held firmly in his hand. He moved like a coiled snake, suddenly upon Mitchell with no warning, the gun pressed firmly into his neck.
"I should kill you right now," Vaughn hissed, his anger taking over. Normally stoic, controlled, whenever it came to issues of his father the control left as fast as a warm Indian breeze at the end of summer. It was his catalyst, and Mitchell knew exactly what to say to spark this buried temper.
But why?
Sydney struggled with this for a second. Why, when seated and bound on an airplane, would he continue to taunt Vaughn into this state? Even back at the house he had been bating the man, using everything in his power to provoke the worst in her partner. It wasn't a smart move, for a man in his position, and as someone who had, at one time, held the same job, he knew this. So why?
She was missing something, something Vaughn would have been able to recognize if he weren't so - angry!
Sydney shot out of her seat, slender yet muscular arms wrapping themselves around his torso, pulling him up from his position over Mitchell. She'd always thought she were the stronger of the two, always thought she could take him if need be. But as she struggled to move him, as he stayed stationary, she feared for a moment that she would be the loser, only for a bit, if she were forced to fight him. Detachment from her intended victims helped her fight more efficiently. How would love factor into that equation?
"Don't make me hurt you," she said, leaning into him. His eyes widened with the sound of her voice, knocking him momentarily off balance. The pair fell to the ground, the gun sliding out of sight and out of reach.
"You'd really hurt me?" Vaughn asked, sitting against a seat. Sydney laughed and pulled him to his feet.
"I'd kick your ass."
It was only then that she noticed Mitchell's nervousness, personified by his wide eyes and shaking manor.
If only she could calm Vaughn down, she might figure this out.
::
Home.
Tired beyond belief, Sydney collapsed on her couch, letting out a large sigh as she did so. Brown hair fanned around her as if she were posing for some kind of photo shoot; she looked absolutely exhausted. Kicking her shoes off the side of the couch, she turned onto her side and dug through her purse for the bottle of water stowed in there and took a drink.
Food.
She hadn't even noticed her stomach growling all the way back from the airport, where Mitchell had been taken into formal custody and Vaughn had followed along, wanted for some reason by Kendall. She was promptly sent home for some rest and a day off for all her work in Colombia.
She was so spoiled.
Sighing, she let an arm flop over her eyes and groaned aloud. Food meant she'd have to get up from her nice comfortable position on the couch and move around to get something edible in the house - she seriously doubted that, though, since it was just Will alone in the house for the last few days, and he lived on take-out when he remembered to eat. She was just about to deal with it and get up when Will's voice floated down to her from over the back of the couch.
"I thought I heard you. You will not believe the day I've had," he smiled, clear blue eyes grinning from behind his glasses. He quickly rounded the couch and fell next to her in the space she'd cleared by shifting. "Well, okay, so maybe yours was a bit more unbelievable, but mine was strange still."
"Okay," she said, smiling a bit, "spill."
"Right. Now I feel like this is a competition of some kind."
"If it were, do you really think you'd win?"
"You have a point there. Okay, so, anyway, I was just working and then - oh, wait, Marshall asked me to give you something. He was going on about how he couldn't just give it to you because of something he said or - whatever. I didn't really understand him."
"What did he ask you to give me, Will," she asked evenly. Will grinned and hit a hand to his forehead as he rose, trotting off to his room to retrieve the folder he'd been reading over the entire day.
Sydney sighed, realizing she wasn't bound to get much rest now, and decided food would still be a great idea. By the time Will returned with the file folder, complete with pieces of notes stuffed inside, she was already halfway through the process of filling a bowl of ice cream, licking her fingers for the third time. Her stomach grumbled louder.
"Ice cream. You sure that's the best thing to eat when you're hungry?"
"Have a better idea?" she retorted, spinning around him to put the ice cream away.
"Not at all," he said, grabbing it from her before she had the chance to deposit it in the freezer. She gave him a mock pouting face and returned to her treat of a meal, taking a bit before asking him about the file. She'd earned that much at least. "So anyway, he gave me this file to give to you and, well, I'm a bit curious."
"Right," she said simply, leaning against the counter as she ate. He continued to get himself some, speaking to her as he did so.
"So I opened the file and he had all these old computer specs in there. You know, stuff from the 60's and 70's. I mean, these things were old and big," he gestured with his hands here, "Nothing like what we have now. Which got me to thinking."
"This is what you spent your afternoon on?" Sydney asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Yeah," he breathed, pausing to put away the now half-melted carton of ice cream. "Anyway, I read over Marshall's notes and such - okay, so I wasn't cleared for it, but Weiss was really helpful - "
Sydney almost spit out her ice cream. "Weiss? Weiss was helping you?"
"Did I just get someone in trouble?"
"No, no, it's justlisten, Will, about that file, we don't want - "
"Vaughn to find out. I know, I talked to Weiss. He told me about this whole computer/disk thing. Well, I was sitting and looking through the files and, Syd, it doesn't make sense."
"How?"
"Disks then didn't work how they do now. You couldn't really put information on them, just retrieve it. And they didn't start up like now. So, I don't know, it just feels like we're not being told the whole story."
"Well, we have a man in custody now that might be able to help fill in these holes," she sighed, suddenly loosing interest in her sweet treat. Will shook his head, his right hand coming free from his bowl to move while he spoke.
"That's just it, Syd. I don't think he can."
"What?"
"Listen, I spent all afternoon going through everything the Agency has on the machines that were around then - the stuff we're dealing with is years ahead of it's time," he explained, closing the distance between them, his blue eyes on fire, fueled by the knowledge he held.
"What are you saying?"
"We had to of supplied whoever had this machine - this computer with, well, it."
"It's ours," Sydney stated, the bottom falling from her stomach.
Ours.
William Vaughn and that team had been chasing after 'stolen' property? No - the CIA had never had anything stolen, instead, they secretly gave things without the knowledge of anyone else. Covert exchanges.
So why did the give the KGB computers in the 1970's?
"Will, don't say anything about this, okay? Not until you hear from me," Sydney stressed. Will nodded somewhat hesitantly, a move she caught, her chocolate brown eyes widening.
"Weiss was working with me. He could have said something to anyon - "
"Call him. Find out, just give me time!"
::
"I don't believe you're being entirely honest with me, Irina," Sloane commented. He sat in the middle of his large concrete office, the darkened lighting reflecting what it could from the slab of black that served as his desktop. There was no warmth in this room, no touch of personality, just darkness and illusion - the true tools of the trade. He sat like a king's aide upon the throne when left alone in the castle, a sense of achievement lying under the restlessness that came with the possibility of being caught.
Devoid of natural light, of smell, of sound, the room seemed hardly natural, throwing his visitors off slightly as they sat in one of his chairs, facing him as he spoke.
Irina simply matched his gaze.
"In fact," he continued, drawing out his words just as she did on occasion. And while she did so for lack of complete fluency, he let the words settle in his companion's mind as a heavy stake falls in their stomach, heavy and uncomfortable. "I believe you're leading me astray so you can conduct your own operation."
"Arvin - "
"I was under the impression that when I extracted you, we entered an equal partnership. Was I mistaken?" he spoke, finishing before she'd be given the opportunity to reply.
She smiled that winning smile that had won over Jack Bristow's frozen heart all those years ago, and leaned forward in her chair.
"Of course not. I have just been collecting information. You're welcome to examine it yourself if you'd like."
Sloane narrowed his eyes at her. What was she up to?
::
"You shouldn't have called me here. You know that with all that's been going on *any* meetings outside the office are dangerous."
Sydney was used to the lecture her father gave the moment he exited his sleek black car, the door closing but making little sound. He swept around it, meeting her on the other side, hidden between the two vehicles and thankful for once that his only child drove an SUV.
"Here," she said first, dispensing with the pleasantries her father would only be annoyed to hear. "Marshall did some more research."
Jack took the folder nonchalantly, his expression sour as he opened the folder and started flipping through the pages. He paused, catching sight of Will's hurried scrawl, a lasting remnant of his reporting days, his brown eyes flickering up to read his daughter's expression.
"What were we doing giving the KGB advanced computers?"
Jack sighed, weighing his options. She was most likely to find out on her own, and while in the past he withheld information from her so she would do precisely that, her skills were honed to the point in which he'd hear back from her in accusatory tones within the hour (minus the time it took to return to the office).
"Sydney, you have to understand how things were back then," he said first, testing the waters of the conversation. She simply looked back at him, eyes impassive, arms crossed. "Agents disappeared left and right; black market deals were made to get them back."
"At what cost? Agents you saved lived while others died," she responded. "Dad, we gave them exactly what we're looking for! Doesn't that seem a little odd to you?"
"You're taking this out of context. How they used what we gave them was beyond our control."
"Beyond our control? We shouldn't have given it to them in the first place!"
"I admit, we did make some mistakes in the past, but no one could foresee this."
"William Vaughn did."
Jack was caught off guard. "What?"
"Think about it. Look at the timelines. He was gone when he found out about the computer. How could he have given Vaughn the information before going out into the field if he hadn't seen this coming?" she asked.
"You have a flare for the dramatic, Sydney. Are you accusing William Vaughn of being affiliated with the KGB?" Jack asked of her. She looked off into the distance beyond his shoulder, her eyes moist.
"I can't explain it. There's this hole, we're missing something."
"Sydney, you have to be careful with this. You can't go around accusing a dead patriot like Vaughn with something like this."
"I know!"
Jack's mouth opened as he was ready to reply when his phone rang. Grumbling, he answered it, his face darkening as he listened to what the person on the other end had to say. He hung up without so little as a goodbye and felt a pang of pity for his daughter.
"What was it?" she inquired.
"Vaughn. It appears that after his little display on the airplane." Sydney winced at this, not all that surprised on how quick the word of Vaughn's loss of control had spread through the Joint Operations Center. "That Kendall has deemed him unfit to carry this disk's location. He's undergoing regression therapy."
The blood drained from Sydney's face. "Don't they know how dangerous that is?! What if they say - Irina *warned* them against doing - "
"But Irina is gone, now. Kendall will do whatever he sees as necessary to get this all behind us, and it appears that Vaughn's sanity is at the bottom of his list."
