Tony was not sure what was going to happen next. He had Michelle and
Kim now, but the men still stood there ready to gun them down. Tony hoped
that Mandy would keep her word. The ten minutes were some of the longest
ten minutes in Tony's life.
Finally, one of the men yelled over, "You can leave now. Don't try to follow them."
Tony let out his breath. It felt like he had been holding it for the entire ten minutes. Chase, Richard, Jim, Kim, Michelle, and Tony all piled into the one car and drove off. Tony stopped to let Richard, Jim, and Chase out to go to the other car. Kim waited for the others to leave before she started in on Tony, "What are we going to do? They still have my father."
"Kim, we are going to try to track them. He is relatively fine right now. If they wanted him dead, they would have killed all of us at his apartment. We will find him." Tony said half-believing himself.
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Jack woke up on a bed. He went to move his right arm when he heard the familiar clink of a metal against another metallic thing. He looked up to where his right hand hung and noticed the handcuffs. At that moment he also noticed that his feet were taped together too. Not knowing where he was, he tried to take in his surroundings when he started to feel nauseated.
The door to the hotel room opened. Amber walked in and set a paper bag down on the small table with her keys. She went back to the door and locked it. When she turned around, she noticed that Jack was awake. She walked up to his side and asked, "How do you feel?"
Jack was surprised that she was asking a question like that. Before he could speak again, another wave a nausea came over him and he knew that he was going to be sick soon. "I think I might be sick." He said holding back his upchuck reflex.
Amber ran over to the table and grabbed the keys off it. She could tell that he was not feeling well by the lack of color in his face, but just to be safe, she said, "If you fuck with me, you are going to get hurt. There are more guys outside in a car." She uncuffed his right hand, untapped his feet, and helped him to the bathroom.
No sooner did he reach the toilet he began to puke. He sat kneeling by the toilet had hanging over it puking up bile from his empty stomach.
Amber stood in the back never being one to handle someone else who was sick. She was not sure how to proceed. This clearly was not part of a scheme of his to get free. She went out to the bedroom area again opening the small fridge grabbing out a bottle of water the hotel was kind enough to provide. She returned to the bathroom where Jack now sat leaning against the shower door. She opened the bottle of water and handed it to him.
He took the water and took a big gulp trying to get the taste of the acidic bile. When he finished, he felt another wave of nausea and went back to his previous position and began puking again. After a few minutes of dry heaving, he finally sat up again laying against the door of the shower. He hated getting sick especially when it was nothing but bile. That had to be the worse kind of sickness. He sat shivering suddenly cold on the floor not knowing where he was at or sure of how he got there.
Amber noticed that Jack was shaking and sweating. She walked out to the bedroom area and grabbed the blanket off the bed and returned to the bathroom. She put the blanket on Jack and sat on the floor next to him, unsure of how to proceed., and unsure of how she felt. Earlier that day she wanted him dead and had hurt him, and now she wanted to comfort him. Earlier, she hated him for setting her father up to die, but now she knows that was not the case, and Jack felt horrible for losing men over in Kosovo. The words he said to her leaving his apartment got to her, she tried to hide it, but the thought of what she was now doing with her life being disappointing to her father was not just Jack's way of getting to her, was telling the truth. "Are you feeling better now?" She asked Jack full of confusion.
"I think I'm done puking, if that is what you are asking." Jack said with more anger than he wanted to show.
"Than why don't we move you back to the bed where you can get under more covers and warm up? I think you have a fever, but I'm not sure." Amber said standing up. She helped Jack stand and walked next to him back to the bed. She pulled the covers back for him and he laid down in the bed. She pulled the covers back up over him putting the main one back on top of the bed. She walked over to the table and sat down watching him, not sure if the thought of food would sound appetizing to him or make him sick again. She asked anyway, "Do you want something to eat?"
"No" Jack said in almost a whine.
"Okay, let me know if you do." She watched him slowly, his body stopped shaking and his features relaxed. Watching his chest slowly fall and rise, she thought she could almost tell the time in which he went from awake to asleep again. She watched for a few more minutes before she got up out of the chair and turned the TV on in a low volume.
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When Tony got back to CTU. he explained all of what happened to Chappelle who was furious with Tony for taking Darla and Jim out of CTU.
"I had to. They were going to kill two of our agents, and Jack." He said trying to obscure the fact that he did it to save his wife, and friends.
Chappelle knowing all too well said, "No, they were going to kill your wife. That is all you cared about. You have now lost a federal agent and an ex-federal agent again. How am I going to explain this to Division?"
"I'm not sure. If you don't mind, I have to call the President and brief him on this. He wanted me to keep in apprised of the situation." Tony stated worried that in a moment he would lose his job.
"Fine. I'll figure out what to say to Division." Chappelle thought to himself This is the second time in two years I have put my ass on the line for Jack. What is wrong with me?
"Thank you, sir." Tony said as Chappelle left the office.
Chase came up to Tony's office and sat down on the couch waiting for Tony to tell him what happened.
"I got to call the President and let him know what happened. Chappelle is going to cover things from Division. Can you get an APB out on Jack, Darla, and the women we saw today with the local police and other federal agencies? Then talk to some of your contacts and see if they know anything about the other woman today. She's completely unknown to us. Why didn't Jack mention her earlier?" Tony asked as if talking to himself.
"Consider it done." Chase said standing up and leaving Tony to call the President.
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Palmer was not happy with Tony nor Jack for that matter after Tony finished briefing him. He said good-bye and walked out to the balcony to be alone. The Secret Service hated it when he did it, but he had to think. He could not be pissed that Jack was taken again because it was not Jack's fault. Jack went home like Palmer had asked of him and he had no control of the people finding him. What in the hell do these people want with Jack? He's been out of the game for a while now so he wouldn't have any current information, Tony or Chase would have been a better grab.
One of the Secret Service agents walked out onto the balcony and said, "Excuse me, sir. A Mr. Jonathan Watts is here to see you. He says he works for the CIA."
"I'll see him. I know him and need to talk to him." The president said surprised at first that the man would show up at the hotel.
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Jack woke up with a jerk. He was still cold, but now he was covered in sweat. He looked around the room and noticed that Amber was nowhere in sight. If he was going to get out of this, now would be the time. He wondered if they had Kim and Michelle stashed somewhere else. He then thought about Tony, and where he was. They never brought him down. Jack slid out of the bed. When he stood up, he felt dizzy. He knew he was running a fever and that was why he was dizzy, his head was pounding, and his ears were ringing. All of these things happened when his temperature would rise.
Having his bearings now, he walked towards the door only bumping into the night stand once. Before he opened the door he remembered Amber's warning earlier, "If you fuck with me, you are going to get hurt. There are more guys outside in a car." He wondered Are those other guys were really outside? If so, were they still there? He was just going to have to find out. He turned the doorknob and nothing happened. He unlocked the door and tried it again this time getting results. The door opened. He was on the second floor of a hotel. Now outside on the balcony area of the hotel, he looked down at the parking lot to see if there were any suspicious cars or people hanging around. He skimmed the windows of the cars and did not notice anyone sitting in any of them. He continued down the balcony towards the steps that led down to the first floor. He used the rail to walk towards the stairs feeling dizzy still. He reached the first floor area that was a small area with vending machines. He was almost out he thought to himself. When he went to turn the corner to go through the parking lot, he felt through his sweat soaked shirt a cold hard thing pressed into his back. He stopped in his tracks and turned his head to find a man he did not know standing there with a silenced Glock 17 handgun pointed at him.
"Let's go back to the room now Jack. This was enough for an adventure today. You don't look like you're in any condition to be walking around like this anyway." The man smiled at Jack. He had won, and Jack knew it.
Jack led them back towards the hotel room. When he got inside, he stood with his one good arm at his side. "What now?"
"Why don't you sit down on the bed?" The man asked locking the door.
Jack walked towards the bed, but before he reached the bed the man walked over to him and smashed the butt of his Glock into Jacks face. Jack fell back against the night stand putting his one good hand on the wall to keep him from falling on the floor.
"Sit down." The man commanded in an angry voice.
Jack sat on the bed using his hand to try to stop the blood from the new cut on his face from dripping into his eye.
The unknown man walked over to Jack and yanked his good arm away from his face. He then pulled a pair of handcuffs from the handcuff holder attached to his belt in the back hidden by his shirt, he cuffed Jack's good arm to the bed again. He then walked over to the chair and sat down waiting for Amber to return so he could complain to her about leaving Jack alone and unrestrained.
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Amber left the room for what she calculated as ten minutes to go and get food. She had not eaten all day and even if Jack said he was not hungry, he had not eaten all day either. When she walked back into the room, she noticed he had blood trickling down the side of his face onto his shirt, and that he was cuffed to the bed again. She then noticed one of the woman's guys sitting in the room with him.
The first thing out of the guy's mouth was, "You are fucking stupid, bitch. Leaving him unattended and unrestrained, you are just asking him to escape. I'm not sure if I should leave you alone with him. What are you guys playing house now? I see you brought him food."
"Fuck you. I was told to make sure he was comfortable until whoever it was gets here. If you have a problem, call your boss. You guys were just supposed to stay outside."
"I was outside. I noticed him leaving the room and getting ready to make a run for it. I stopped him."
"By bashing him in the head, that's smart."
"No, I did that later so he would not try it again."
"That's real smart. Now get the fuck out." Amber said pissed off that he had gone directly against the woman's orders and hit Jack again.
The man got up from the chair and left the room. He had made his point and that was all he wanted to do. He would return to his car and wait for her to mess up again. He was tired of cleaning up other people's messes all of the time, and he was really tired of baby-sitter duty.
Amber walked over to Jack and checked the new cut on his face. It was still bleeding so she walked to the bathroom and found a band-aid to put over the cut by his eyebrow. When she returned, she gently put the band-aid on saying, "You really shouldn't have done that. He could have done worse, and you are in no position to take or give a beating at the moment."
Jack did not answer her or look at her, he knew she was right, and he would not admit it. "Why are you doing this? Why not just walk away now before you get hurt? You are a smart girl and you know this is not what your father would have wanted you to do."
"Don't analyze me. You don't even know me. I do this because it is paying me. I started out for vengeance and now it's money."
"If you help me, I'll help you. No one knows about your involvement yet. I did not mention you to anyone and I can get Michelle and Kim to stay quiet about you. That won't be hard. I can say that you were kind of forced into it earlier today. You were given the choice help us or die, and you did what every other sane person would do. Just help me get out of here and find my daughter and Michelle."
"They're fine. We traded them earlier for Darla." Amber said feeling she should relieve some of his stress.
"Fine then, it's easier you help me get out of here and let them know where Darla would be. I promise you I will keep you out of jail and safe." Jack said trying not to sound too much like he was begging.
"You talk as if you know me. You saw me maybe once in my life. You knew my father, who was not the best man in the world. He chose to go on the mission with you and leave me and my mother behind. Every time he came back from one of his missions, he would promise never to leave again and always did. For most of my life, I never saw him so when he died, it was not that big of a change. He chose his job over me. Do you know how that feels? I loved him and hated him at the same time, so don't tell me about myself. You have never had to live like I had to. My mother went crazy after he died and I was shipped from family member to family member until there wasn't anyone left, so I was left on my own at sixteen. Ever since then, I have been trying to survive. DON'T LECTURE ME ABOUT WHAT I'M SUPPOSED TO DO WITH MY LIFE!" Amber said almost in tears from anger.
"I can help you. You don't have to live like this. I can keep you safe and even help you start over. I know what it's like, believe me." Jack said trying to get through. He knew he was almost there; just a little more pushing and he would be there.
"How are you going to protect me? You couldn't even protect your own wife or your daughter for that matter. How many times has Kim been kidnapped or in some other sort of danger?" She was pissed now and nothing was going to stop her from telling him like it is.
Jack looked away and stayed silent, pissed off. All of the anger of losing Teri coming back. He thought he had gotten rid of all of it the day he killed Nina, but sometimes it came back. Killing Nina did not and he knew it would not, bring Teri back, but he thought it might have given him closure, but it had not. He still felt horrible at times because of it, depression slowly coming in and out from time to time because of it. He no longer hated himself as much as he had the year after his wife's death, but it still hurt and nothing could take that back, not even dying because he knew that there was no chance he would get into heaven if it existed. He had killed and hurt too many people in his life and that would be one more thing he would have to atone for.
Amber walked away still pissed, but now more pissed at herself. She went to the table where she had set the food down. She grabbed one of the bags and handed it to Jack, "Here's some soup. I know you said you weren't hungry, but you haven't eaten all day and you need to eat."
Jack went to take it from her when the familiar clink of the cuff sounded. She set the bag on the bed and went to go find her keys. When she found them she uncuffed his hand from the bed. He grabbed the bag taking it's contents out. A Styrofoam bowl of soup, there was no spoon in the bag so he took the lid off and drank the chicken noodle soup out of the bowl. When he got halfway through, he started to feel sick again so he set it down and turned his thought back to trying to get through to Amber.
Amber sat at the table eating a sandwich from the deli she got Jack's soup from. She was happy to see that he took food from her. She still had a hint of anger, but started to feel bad for rubbing his wife in his face. Why was she feeling bad? She thought all of the sudden. Why am I caring for him? I am supposed to watch him and then turn him over to the woman and he will probably not make it through that. She told herself to stop getting attached, but there was something there he had something she could not explain. She was really embarrassed at the apartment when she asked him to help her move in, she almost did not go through with it. When she heard him singing and then saw him, he was not the monster she had created all of those nights in her mind. He wasn't even guilty of killing her father she believed now. If he wasn't, then who was? "Did you ever find out who set you guys up?" She asked breaking the silence.
"No." Jack bended the truth, it was not a lie because he had not set them up to fail, or so he promised. Jack was not sure if the President had been lying about that part. He no longer thought he could tell when the President was lying because he had fallen twice for a lie from him.
"Do you think it was someone in the government? The people who gave the go ahead on the mission?"
Jack looked at her and said, "It most likely was someone in the government. Very few people knew about the mission and very fewer people knew when and where and how it was going to go down. A lot less knew what equipment we were going to be using. Just which of those people did it, I'm not sure. The only person who would ever know for sure was killed and he took that to the grave with him unfortunately. I'm sure it wasn't him, but he probably knew who it was."
"Do you think you'll ever find them?"
"Probably not. I tried for a long time while I was in CTU, but noting ever came out of it." Jack said now lying because he knew he would find out as soon as he got out of this situation.
"How does a person as intelligent as yourself get wrapped up in CTU anyways?" She asked trying to keep the conversation going, and to get to know more about him to see if she could trust him.
"It's a long story." He said trying to avoid answering the question.
"We've got time to waste. I promise none of it will leave this room. Just between you and me." She said reassuringly.
He didn't want to tell her, but maybe if he did, she would see that he had a similar background and she would trust him more. Taking a deep breath. he exhaled sighing, "I left for the Army the day after my high school graduation. I excelled in the Army's basic training. Someone recommended me to try for Delta. So I went into that after basic training. They busted my balls in it and I kept rising to the occasion. After that, I was assigned to a Delta unit and went on missions with them. A few years of that, I started to go to college to get my bachelors in English Literature, and then my masters in criminology. I did more years in Delta getting certified for S.W.A.T. when we started more urban fighting tactics. I ran into an old friend right before I had to choose whether or not I wanted to continue another four or more years in Delta after about ten years of it. My friend recruited me to work for CTU at the time I had offers from many different organizations to join them. Coral Snake, CIA, FBI, ATF, and even the LAPD. I chose to go with the CIA and work for CTU more specify. Richard Walsh, my friend, recruited me and helped me get in. I owed him a lot so I figured that was one way to make it up. I also had a family then and I couldn't keep leaving on missions for Delta and not know if I would return. Kim was two or three when we moved to L.A. and I started to work for CTU full-time."
"What made you join the Army right out of high school?"
"It was the only way to escape a situation I was in. I could not afford college, and even if I could, I would not be able to escape my past. That's why I joined the Army. There no one could touch me, or so I figured."
"What about your parents? You know all about my father, and probably my mother." She said trying to coax him into talking about his parents. He was clearly avoiding something.
"My mother left when I was ten. I lived with my father and older sister Carol until I joined the Army. I never saw my mother until I went to visit my father in the hospital the day he died."
"What was that like just having a father?" She asked, not knowing what it was to have a father because she had never had one.
"Why don't we talk about you? Really, why do you want to know this stuff anyway? I really shouldn't be telling you all things considered." He said trying to avoid going into it more. He knew if he told her she would trust him more, but the problem was opening up the old wounds.
"Come on, it was probably like the Brady bunch only without the mother, and all of the siblings. Am I right? You were probably rich too."
Suddenly flushed with anger he said, "It was not the Brady bunch, not even close. My father was an alcoholic. He would beat my mom before she left and after she left, he was going to turn on my sister, but I always seemed to jump in to take the beating instead. After a while, he just started going at me instead of her. He spent every dime we had on alcohol and gambling. When I was old enough, I got a job and lied to him about it so my sister could go to college off what little I made. I would work every day after school until early hours in the morning doing anything I could. Every weekend, I spent working and all of it either went to helping my sister in college or buying food. He figured I was out getting into trouble." Jack looked away trying to control the anger that was rising in him.
Before Amber could say anything, the door opened and Mandy and the woman walked in. Mandy noticed the tension in the room and ignored it hoping no one else would. Jack had been staring at the bathroom and did not look over to see who had walked in, but when he did, he did not have enough will power to keep the look of shock off his face.
Noticing the same shock on Jack's face that had been on Kim's face. When she saw this woman, Amber began to wonder who she was.
"Hello Jack." The woman said in a cold happy voice.
"You are dead. I know you are dead. I killed you myself. I shot you three times point blank. You were dead."
"You are not the best assassin in the world Jack. I mean first you fail to kill Victor, then you can't even kill me when I was helpless. Maybe you are not as good as everyone thinks you are."
"You are not here." Jack said sure of himself. He had killed her, there was no way she could still be alive.
Finally, one of the men yelled over, "You can leave now. Don't try to follow them."
Tony let out his breath. It felt like he had been holding it for the entire ten minutes. Chase, Richard, Jim, Kim, Michelle, and Tony all piled into the one car and drove off. Tony stopped to let Richard, Jim, and Chase out to go to the other car. Kim waited for the others to leave before she started in on Tony, "What are we going to do? They still have my father."
"Kim, we are going to try to track them. He is relatively fine right now. If they wanted him dead, they would have killed all of us at his apartment. We will find him." Tony said half-believing himself.
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Jack woke up on a bed. He went to move his right arm when he heard the familiar clink of a metal against another metallic thing. He looked up to where his right hand hung and noticed the handcuffs. At that moment he also noticed that his feet were taped together too. Not knowing where he was, he tried to take in his surroundings when he started to feel nauseated.
The door to the hotel room opened. Amber walked in and set a paper bag down on the small table with her keys. She went back to the door and locked it. When she turned around, she noticed that Jack was awake. She walked up to his side and asked, "How do you feel?"
Jack was surprised that she was asking a question like that. Before he could speak again, another wave a nausea came over him and he knew that he was going to be sick soon. "I think I might be sick." He said holding back his upchuck reflex.
Amber ran over to the table and grabbed the keys off it. She could tell that he was not feeling well by the lack of color in his face, but just to be safe, she said, "If you fuck with me, you are going to get hurt. There are more guys outside in a car." She uncuffed his right hand, untapped his feet, and helped him to the bathroom.
No sooner did he reach the toilet he began to puke. He sat kneeling by the toilet had hanging over it puking up bile from his empty stomach.
Amber stood in the back never being one to handle someone else who was sick. She was not sure how to proceed. This clearly was not part of a scheme of his to get free. She went out to the bedroom area again opening the small fridge grabbing out a bottle of water the hotel was kind enough to provide. She returned to the bathroom where Jack now sat leaning against the shower door. She opened the bottle of water and handed it to him.
He took the water and took a big gulp trying to get the taste of the acidic bile. When he finished, he felt another wave of nausea and went back to his previous position and began puking again. After a few minutes of dry heaving, he finally sat up again laying against the door of the shower. He hated getting sick especially when it was nothing but bile. That had to be the worse kind of sickness. He sat shivering suddenly cold on the floor not knowing where he was at or sure of how he got there.
Amber noticed that Jack was shaking and sweating. She walked out to the bedroom area and grabbed the blanket off the bed and returned to the bathroom. She put the blanket on Jack and sat on the floor next to him, unsure of how to proceed., and unsure of how she felt. Earlier that day she wanted him dead and had hurt him, and now she wanted to comfort him. Earlier, she hated him for setting her father up to die, but now she knows that was not the case, and Jack felt horrible for losing men over in Kosovo. The words he said to her leaving his apartment got to her, she tried to hide it, but the thought of what she was now doing with her life being disappointing to her father was not just Jack's way of getting to her, was telling the truth. "Are you feeling better now?" She asked Jack full of confusion.
"I think I'm done puking, if that is what you are asking." Jack said with more anger than he wanted to show.
"Than why don't we move you back to the bed where you can get under more covers and warm up? I think you have a fever, but I'm not sure." Amber said standing up. She helped Jack stand and walked next to him back to the bed. She pulled the covers back for him and he laid down in the bed. She pulled the covers back up over him putting the main one back on top of the bed. She walked over to the table and sat down watching him, not sure if the thought of food would sound appetizing to him or make him sick again. She asked anyway, "Do you want something to eat?"
"No" Jack said in almost a whine.
"Okay, let me know if you do." She watched him slowly, his body stopped shaking and his features relaxed. Watching his chest slowly fall and rise, she thought she could almost tell the time in which he went from awake to asleep again. She watched for a few more minutes before she got up out of the chair and turned the TV on in a low volume.
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When Tony got back to CTU. he explained all of what happened to Chappelle who was furious with Tony for taking Darla and Jim out of CTU.
"I had to. They were going to kill two of our agents, and Jack." He said trying to obscure the fact that he did it to save his wife, and friends.
Chappelle knowing all too well said, "No, they were going to kill your wife. That is all you cared about. You have now lost a federal agent and an ex-federal agent again. How am I going to explain this to Division?"
"I'm not sure. If you don't mind, I have to call the President and brief him on this. He wanted me to keep in apprised of the situation." Tony stated worried that in a moment he would lose his job.
"Fine. I'll figure out what to say to Division." Chappelle thought to himself This is the second time in two years I have put my ass on the line for Jack. What is wrong with me?
"Thank you, sir." Tony said as Chappelle left the office.
Chase came up to Tony's office and sat down on the couch waiting for Tony to tell him what happened.
"I got to call the President and let him know what happened. Chappelle is going to cover things from Division. Can you get an APB out on Jack, Darla, and the women we saw today with the local police and other federal agencies? Then talk to some of your contacts and see if they know anything about the other woman today. She's completely unknown to us. Why didn't Jack mention her earlier?" Tony asked as if talking to himself.
"Consider it done." Chase said standing up and leaving Tony to call the President.
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Palmer was not happy with Tony nor Jack for that matter after Tony finished briefing him. He said good-bye and walked out to the balcony to be alone. The Secret Service hated it when he did it, but he had to think. He could not be pissed that Jack was taken again because it was not Jack's fault. Jack went home like Palmer had asked of him and he had no control of the people finding him. What in the hell do these people want with Jack? He's been out of the game for a while now so he wouldn't have any current information, Tony or Chase would have been a better grab.
One of the Secret Service agents walked out onto the balcony and said, "Excuse me, sir. A Mr. Jonathan Watts is here to see you. He says he works for the CIA."
"I'll see him. I know him and need to talk to him." The president said surprised at first that the man would show up at the hotel.
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Jack woke up with a jerk. He was still cold, but now he was covered in sweat. He looked around the room and noticed that Amber was nowhere in sight. If he was going to get out of this, now would be the time. He wondered if they had Kim and Michelle stashed somewhere else. He then thought about Tony, and where he was. They never brought him down. Jack slid out of the bed. When he stood up, he felt dizzy. He knew he was running a fever and that was why he was dizzy, his head was pounding, and his ears were ringing. All of these things happened when his temperature would rise.
Having his bearings now, he walked towards the door only bumping into the night stand once. Before he opened the door he remembered Amber's warning earlier, "If you fuck with me, you are going to get hurt. There are more guys outside in a car." He wondered Are those other guys were really outside? If so, were they still there? He was just going to have to find out. He turned the doorknob and nothing happened. He unlocked the door and tried it again this time getting results. The door opened. He was on the second floor of a hotel. Now outside on the balcony area of the hotel, he looked down at the parking lot to see if there were any suspicious cars or people hanging around. He skimmed the windows of the cars and did not notice anyone sitting in any of them. He continued down the balcony towards the steps that led down to the first floor. He used the rail to walk towards the stairs feeling dizzy still. He reached the first floor area that was a small area with vending machines. He was almost out he thought to himself. When he went to turn the corner to go through the parking lot, he felt through his sweat soaked shirt a cold hard thing pressed into his back. He stopped in his tracks and turned his head to find a man he did not know standing there with a silenced Glock 17 handgun pointed at him.
"Let's go back to the room now Jack. This was enough for an adventure today. You don't look like you're in any condition to be walking around like this anyway." The man smiled at Jack. He had won, and Jack knew it.
Jack led them back towards the hotel room. When he got inside, he stood with his one good arm at his side. "What now?"
"Why don't you sit down on the bed?" The man asked locking the door.
Jack walked towards the bed, but before he reached the bed the man walked over to him and smashed the butt of his Glock into Jacks face. Jack fell back against the night stand putting his one good hand on the wall to keep him from falling on the floor.
"Sit down." The man commanded in an angry voice.
Jack sat on the bed using his hand to try to stop the blood from the new cut on his face from dripping into his eye.
The unknown man walked over to Jack and yanked his good arm away from his face. He then pulled a pair of handcuffs from the handcuff holder attached to his belt in the back hidden by his shirt, he cuffed Jack's good arm to the bed again. He then walked over to the chair and sat down waiting for Amber to return so he could complain to her about leaving Jack alone and unrestrained.
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Amber left the room for what she calculated as ten minutes to go and get food. She had not eaten all day and even if Jack said he was not hungry, he had not eaten all day either. When she walked back into the room, she noticed he had blood trickling down the side of his face onto his shirt, and that he was cuffed to the bed again. She then noticed one of the woman's guys sitting in the room with him.
The first thing out of the guy's mouth was, "You are fucking stupid, bitch. Leaving him unattended and unrestrained, you are just asking him to escape. I'm not sure if I should leave you alone with him. What are you guys playing house now? I see you brought him food."
"Fuck you. I was told to make sure he was comfortable until whoever it was gets here. If you have a problem, call your boss. You guys were just supposed to stay outside."
"I was outside. I noticed him leaving the room and getting ready to make a run for it. I stopped him."
"By bashing him in the head, that's smart."
"No, I did that later so he would not try it again."
"That's real smart. Now get the fuck out." Amber said pissed off that he had gone directly against the woman's orders and hit Jack again.
The man got up from the chair and left the room. He had made his point and that was all he wanted to do. He would return to his car and wait for her to mess up again. He was tired of cleaning up other people's messes all of the time, and he was really tired of baby-sitter duty.
Amber walked over to Jack and checked the new cut on his face. It was still bleeding so she walked to the bathroom and found a band-aid to put over the cut by his eyebrow. When she returned, she gently put the band-aid on saying, "You really shouldn't have done that. He could have done worse, and you are in no position to take or give a beating at the moment."
Jack did not answer her or look at her, he knew she was right, and he would not admit it. "Why are you doing this? Why not just walk away now before you get hurt? You are a smart girl and you know this is not what your father would have wanted you to do."
"Don't analyze me. You don't even know me. I do this because it is paying me. I started out for vengeance and now it's money."
"If you help me, I'll help you. No one knows about your involvement yet. I did not mention you to anyone and I can get Michelle and Kim to stay quiet about you. That won't be hard. I can say that you were kind of forced into it earlier today. You were given the choice help us or die, and you did what every other sane person would do. Just help me get out of here and find my daughter and Michelle."
"They're fine. We traded them earlier for Darla." Amber said feeling she should relieve some of his stress.
"Fine then, it's easier you help me get out of here and let them know where Darla would be. I promise you I will keep you out of jail and safe." Jack said trying not to sound too much like he was begging.
"You talk as if you know me. You saw me maybe once in my life. You knew my father, who was not the best man in the world. He chose to go on the mission with you and leave me and my mother behind. Every time he came back from one of his missions, he would promise never to leave again and always did. For most of my life, I never saw him so when he died, it was not that big of a change. He chose his job over me. Do you know how that feels? I loved him and hated him at the same time, so don't tell me about myself. You have never had to live like I had to. My mother went crazy after he died and I was shipped from family member to family member until there wasn't anyone left, so I was left on my own at sixteen. Ever since then, I have been trying to survive. DON'T LECTURE ME ABOUT WHAT I'M SUPPOSED TO DO WITH MY LIFE!" Amber said almost in tears from anger.
"I can help you. You don't have to live like this. I can keep you safe and even help you start over. I know what it's like, believe me." Jack said trying to get through. He knew he was almost there; just a little more pushing and he would be there.
"How are you going to protect me? You couldn't even protect your own wife or your daughter for that matter. How many times has Kim been kidnapped or in some other sort of danger?" She was pissed now and nothing was going to stop her from telling him like it is.
Jack looked away and stayed silent, pissed off. All of the anger of losing Teri coming back. He thought he had gotten rid of all of it the day he killed Nina, but sometimes it came back. Killing Nina did not and he knew it would not, bring Teri back, but he thought it might have given him closure, but it had not. He still felt horrible at times because of it, depression slowly coming in and out from time to time because of it. He no longer hated himself as much as he had the year after his wife's death, but it still hurt and nothing could take that back, not even dying because he knew that there was no chance he would get into heaven if it existed. He had killed and hurt too many people in his life and that would be one more thing he would have to atone for.
Amber walked away still pissed, but now more pissed at herself. She went to the table where she had set the food down. She grabbed one of the bags and handed it to Jack, "Here's some soup. I know you said you weren't hungry, but you haven't eaten all day and you need to eat."
Jack went to take it from her when the familiar clink of the cuff sounded. She set the bag on the bed and went to go find her keys. When she found them she uncuffed his hand from the bed. He grabbed the bag taking it's contents out. A Styrofoam bowl of soup, there was no spoon in the bag so he took the lid off and drank the chicken noodle soup out of the bowl. When he got halfway through, he started to feel sick again so he set it down and turned his thought back to trying to get through to Amber.
Amber sat at the table eating a sandwich from the deli she got Jack's soup from. She was happy to see that he took food from her. She still had a hint of anger, but started to feel bad for rubbing his wife in his face. Why was she feeling bad? She thought all of the sudden. Why am I caring for him? I am supposed to watch him and then turn him over to the woman and he will probably not make it through that. She told herself to stop getting attached, but there was something there he had something she could not explain. She was really embarrassed at the apartment when she asked him to help her move in, she almost did not go through with it. When she heard him singing and then saw him, he was not the monster she had created all of those nights in her mind. He wasn't even guilty of killing her father she believed now. If he wasn't, then who was? "Did you ever find out who set you guys up?" She asked breaking the silence.
"No." Jack bended the truth, it was not a lie because he had not set them up to fail, or so he promised. Jack was not sure if the President had been lying about that part. He no longer thought he could tell when the President was lying because he had fallen twice for a lie from him.
"Do you think it was someone in the government? The people who gave the go ahead on the mission?"
Jack looked at her and said, "It most likely was someone in the government. Very few people knew about the mission and very fewer people knew when and where and how it was going to go down. A lot less knew what equipment we were going to be using. Just which of those people did it, I'm not sure. The only person who would ever know for sure was killed and he took that to the grave with him unfortunately. I'm sure it wasn't him, but he probably knew who it was."
"Do you think you'll ever find them?"
"Probably not. I tried for a long time while I was in CTU, but noting ever came out of it." Jack said now lying because he knew he would find out as soon as he got out of this situation.
"How does a person as intelligent as yourself get wrapped up in CTU anyways?" She asked trying to keep the conversation going, and to get to know more about him to see if she could trust him.
"It's a long story." He said trying to avoid answering the question.
"We've got time to waste. I promise none of it will leave this room. Just between you and me." She said reassuringly.
He didn't want to tell her, but maybe if he did, she would see that he had a similar background and she would trust him more. Taking a deep breath. he exhaled sighing, "I left for the Army the day after my high school graduation. I excelled in the Army's basic training. Someone recommended me to try for Delta. So I went into that after basic training. They busted my balls in it and I kept rising to the occasion. After that, I was assigned to a Delta unit and went on missions with them. A few years of that, I started to go to college to get my bachelors in English Literature, and then my masters in criminology. I did more years in Delta getting certified for S.W.A.T. when we started more urban fighting tactics. I ran into an old friend right before I had to choose whether or not I wanted to continue another four or more years in Delta after about ten years of it. My friend recruited me to work for CTU at the time I had offers from many different organizations to join them. Coral Snake, CIA, FBI, ATF, and even the LAPD. I chose to go with the CIA and work for CTU more specify. Richard Walsh, my friend, recruited me and helped me get in. I owed him a lot so I figured that was one way to make it up. I also had a family then and I couldn't keep leaving on missions for Delta and not know if I would return. Kim was two or three when we moved to L.A. and I started to work for CTU full-time."
"What made you join the Army right out of high school?"
"It was the only way to escape a situation I was in. I could not afford college, and even if I could, I would not be able to escape my past. That's why I joined the Army. There no one could touch me, or so I figured."
"What about your parents? You know all about my father, and probably my mother." She said trying to coax him into talking about his parents. He was clearly avoiding something.
"My mother left when I was ten. I lived with my father and older sister Carol until I joined the Army. I never saw my mother until I went to visit my father in the hospital the day he died."
"What was that like just having a father?" She asked, not knowing what it was to have a father because she had never had one.
"Why don't we talk about you? Really, why do you want to know this stuff anyway? I really shouldn't be telling you all things considered." He said trying to avoid going into it more. He knew if he told her she would trust him more, but the problem was opening up the old wounds.
"Come on, it was probably like the Brady bunch only without the mother, and all of the siblings. Am I right? You were probably rich too."
Suddenly flushed with anger he said, "It was not the Brady bunch, not even close. My father was an alcoholic. He would beat my mom before she left and after she left, he was going to turn on my sister, but I always seemed to jump in to take the beating instead. After a while, he just started going at me instead of her. He spent every dime we had on alcohol and gambling. When I was old enough, I got a job and lied to him about it so my sister could go to college off what little I made. I would work every day after school until early hours in the morning doing anything I could. Every weekend, I spent working and all of it either went to helping my sister in college or buying food. He figured I was out getting into trouble." Jack looked away trying to control the anger that was rising in him.
Before Amber could say anything, the door opened and Mandy and the woman walked in. Mandy noticed the tension in the room and ignored it hoping no one else would. Jack had been staring at the bathroom and did not look over to see who had walked in, but when he did, he did not have enough will power to keep the look of shock off his face.
Noticing the same shock on Jack's face that had been on Kim's face. When she saw this woman, Amber began to wonder who she was.
"Hello Jack." The woman said in a cold happy voice.
"You are dead. I know you are dead. I killed you myself. I shot you three times point blank. You were dead."
"You are not the best assassin in the world Jack. I mean first you fail to kill Victor, then you can't even kill me when I was helpless. Maybe you are not as good as everyone thinks you are."
"You are not here." Jack said sure of himself. He had killed her, there was no way she could still be alive.