Chapter 18: Unwrapped
Disclaimer: No, Alias does not belong to me. But I promise my ideas are, to my knowledge, original.
Sark flew by himself to hunt up Dr. Eugene Reeves. The flight was quick; he was in Geneva by nightfall in LA. It was early morning in Geneva. A few hours before most places opened.
But Eugene Reeves was dedicated to his practice. He would be in his office an hour, may be more, before his door opened.
Sark was right. He was sitting at Reeves' desk in the dark when the man walked in at ten till eight. The light flooded the room, punctuated by the click of the light switch, and Sark leaned back and stared at the doctor.
Eugene Reeves looked, blinked, and looked again. While a brilliant man academically, and an excellent doctor, the man had a very low level of awareness of his fellow man. Sark probably could have stood in a dark corner instead of sitting garishly in the man's desk chair and never bee noticed.
"What do you want?" Reeves asked, none of the fear he felt reflected in his strong voice. "I told you I wasn't doing any more."
Sark sat silently and, after a few beats, nodded to the still open door.
"I upheld my end of the bargain, you paid me. We have no further agreement," Reeves asserted as he closed the door and shrugged out of his jacket.
"I want to see the file," Sark said simply. Then he waived his hand at the filing cabinets lining the wall. "Get it."
Frowning and throwing Sark a look that was far from subservient, Reeves complied. He produced a key, opened the third drawer decisively, and thumbed through the back few files. Then he stilled.
"It doesn't seem to be here."
"Do you frequently lose files on your patients, doctor?" Sark asked, and Reeves was surprised to find him barely a foot away.
"No," Reeves said defiantly.
"Well, that's all right," Sark said, a deceiving smile on his face. "You can just tell me what was in this one." There was a short pause, and Sark continued in a congenial voice. "All about how you lied to me, how you deceived me into believing she was mine, the one I wanted." His voice grew dangerous. "How you caused me to waste three years and more of my life on a child that did not fulfill the Rambaldi prophecy I set out to achieve…"
"Rambaldi?" Reeves asked, panicked now. "What the…wait…you…"
Out of thin air, it seemed, Sark produced a handgun with a silencer on it and put a bullet in Reeves. The man sank to the floor, a shocked expression on his face. He pressed a hand to his stomach and seemed confused when his fingers came away sticky with his own blood. He looked from the blood to Sark, his eyes growing dimmer.
"Good day, doctor," Sark said, looking down on Reeves' bleeding form. Then he walked out.
The usual group was back in the conference room, plus the DSR trio. Jack had, at Vaughn's suggestion, been included to ensure he was nearby for his arrest later.
"Dr. Eugene Reeves," Dixon said, pressing a button so that a picture of a smiling man appeared on the screen. He watched the faces of his agents. "He was murdered in his office last night."
Dixon saw Sydney's eyes brighten a little, but she showed no real reaction.
"Reeves practiced in vitro fertilization, and was doing research in embryo transfer--transferring an embryo from one mother to another."
Jack began to look a little unsure, but he kept still about it.
"I find it to be hardly a coincidence that only hours before, we acquired a file from Reeves. The file outlines an execution of an experimental procedure, unknown to the person who commissioned the project. It was supposed to be a simple, commonplace procedure, but for some reason the doctor told his employer otherwise.
"We have," he continued. "Incontrovertible proof that this experiment resulted in Kelly. We know who commissioned the project, and who paid the doctor over two million dollars for his--shall we say discretion--in the matter. We know the name Sark's informant gave himself. We know that informant is obsessed with Rambaldi. We know he gave Sark false information about an unknown prophecy to further his own agenda. We know he had intimate control over key players in the prophecy."
Dixon stopped. He pressed another button, and the image on the screen disappeared, focusing all attentions on him.
"We also know that the informant in one of our own."
A roar of voices filled the room, there were so many who'd been kept out of the loop. Several stood. Jack was one of them. When Jack began to move toward the door, Dixon nodded to Harte and Quentin, and they intercepted him and cuffed him.
The roar only grew louder. Everyone was shouting now, may be a dozen agents. Only Sydney and Vaughn remained quiet and seated, while Dixon and Kendall stood calmly awaiting a recession in the noise level. Harte and Quentin eased out of the room to put Jack in his own soundproof cell.
Dixon finally tired of the noise.
"QUIET!" he bellowed.
As everyone else sat down, Sydney stood. Dixon nodded to her to go ahead; he wasn't looking forward to facing this group.
"We've suspected for weeks now that we had a mole," she said. "The most efficient way to identify a mole is to limit the information eh can get a hold of. That's all Director Dixon did, and, as you can see, we caught our mole."
"Sydney, this is your father!" Weiss spoke up loudly. A murmur of agreement rippled through the still restless government employees. "As many times as you've defended him, how…"
"Every time I have defended him, he helped. He may have been furthering his own agenda, and his actions may have been immoral, but they got the job done. This is different. This time he stooped to kidnapping, consorting with criminals to the detriment of this agency, and plotting the abduction of an agent."
Everyone fell quiet. If Sydney would denounce her father, who were they to argue?
"Most of you would have access to the information eventually," Dixon said. "But it's best to get it out of the way now. Kelly is Agent Bristow's child. Hers and Agent Vaughn's. Anyone asks how, I'll lock you up for stupidity and indelicacy. All you need to know is that Kelly was born as a result of Reeves' illegal medical experiment. That is all anyone needs to know," he stressed. "Jack was feeding Sark information, basically provoking him to go after Sydney and Kelly. He is believed to have had access to a Rambaldi prophecy no one else has seen."
Jack sat alone in the cold, hard cell, thinking. He'd reacted too fast. He should have sat it out a little longer, found out exactly what they knew. He hadn't known the doctor's name, but Sark should haves checked up on the man more closely. The doctor was dead now.
He could play it off now, get a spot in a high security mental hospital. Hell, if they decided to interrogate him, in Camp Harris may be, he might just earn that spot.
Jack stared intently at the wall. The less conscious he seemed now, the better. May be the psychologists would conclude he had cracked when he'd been arrested and insist he was…
"You son of a bitch," Sydney's voice broke into his thoughts. He hadn't heard her enter the cell. That was new.
Jack carefully didn't look at her. The brick wall was really interesting, if you looked at it long enough.
"Don't pretend you don't hear me! I know damn well that you're as lucid as me! LOOK AT ME GOD DAMN IT!"
Jack continued to stare at the wall. Look, you could see designs…a spider's web…now a little bird…look, faces…
Thwap.
Jack looked up in surprise at a furious, wild-eyed Sydney. When had she moved? He felt vaguely as if he was encased in wool, kept away from the world. He--wait, she was talking. What was she saying? He could barely hear her.
"…daughter! Where the hell is that prophecy?!?"
Burned it, he thought triumphantly.
"Burned it! Dammit!" Sydney raved, pacing back and forth furiously.
Had he spoken aloud?
Sydney took one look at him, blew out a furious breath, and shouted to someone to let her out.
Sydney stormed up the hall, pausing only briefly to wait for the heavy iron barred doors to open. She exploded into the guards' station, where Vaughn and Kelly waited. Irina was accounted for by a one-way radio the size of a cell phone.
"I'm beginning to think he's really crazy! Really honest to God crazy!" she yelled. "He told me he burned the prophecy! How can I protect my daughter when I don't know…"
"Our daughter," Vaughn broke in firmly, puling Kelly close to his side with his arm around her. "We'll protect our daughter."
All the anger and frustration drained out of her, and all Sydney could feel was love. Her love for the two people before her, and their love. She relaxed and smiled softly.
"I know. Let's go home," she said, hugging them both. "It's just that it's been two weeks, and this is the first time he's said anything. And he looked surprised that he'd said it." She shook her head. "It was a sham at first, no doubt. But I think he'd driving himself crazy."
"Come on, baby," Vaughn said gently. "Don't think about it. Dixon promised to have him transferred by Monday. Kelly doesn't need to be here, anyway. Let's go home, so I can enjoy my weekend with my girls."
"When we get home, can we play a game?" Kelly asked, tugging on her parents' hands.
"Sure, sweetie," Sydney said.
"What do you want to play?" Vaughn asked.
Kelly skipped along thoughtfully for a moment.
"Hide and go seek!" she bubbled finally, a wide smile on her face.
Vaughn rolled his eyes, and Sydney laughed. It had been his idea to teach her that game because he was tired of unpacking. Who knew they had so much stuff? There were still unpacked boxes in every room of their new house. Plus all the wedding gifts their friends had given them, plus stuff they'd given Kelly…hell, half of that was still unwrapped!
Kelly was going to be okay, though. They'd all three gone to a renowned child psychologist earlier that day, and the woman had assured them that as long as Sydney and Vaughn had time to make her feel wanted and part of a family, Kelly had every chance of growing up to be a completely normal adult.
And, Sydney thought with a smile, Vaughn and I have more than enough love to go around.
, Sydney thought with a smile,They were finally together.
I didn't use that last line on my rough draft, but I had to add it. The next to the last line just didn't wrap it all up nice and neat. And that's all, folks! What did you think? I kinda like the Jack's-insane touch myself. His hard-ass-I-do-what-I-want routine would get to him eventually, anyway…this is even better, in my opinion, than shooting him!