Blood Binds – But Betrayal Blinds
FOUR – Slaughtered Aspiration
Rating: PG/PG-13
Setting: Prague, LA, Unknown Location in Eastern Europe
Characters: Will Tippin, Elle Williams (Maggie Gyllenhaal), Michael Vaughn, Marcus Dixon, Sark, Aiden Ivanov (Hugh Dancy or James Franco), Abs Michaelis (Jessica Alba), Steph Mariani (Eliza Dushku), Allison Doren, Lauren Reed, Jack Bristow, Eric Weiss, Sydney Bristow, Simon Walker, McKenas Cole mentionedIrina Derevko
Length: 2,663Words
The feeling in the room goes from a sense of anticipation and nerves in the air, to a looming cloud of uncertainty and sadness. Will slowly removes his head set, looking at the woman he and Vaughn rushed in, letting a heavy breath leave his mouth. He looks down, then back up at her, from behind his wire framed glasses. "What... what does that mean?" She asks, looking at him. Instantly he begins to feel upset, praying that somehow Sydney will make contact.
Will closes his eyes, shaking his head for a moment. He doesn't want to lose Sydney again. She is his best friend and the only one who understands him anymore. "That means we just lost an agent." Dixon states, taking his head set off as well. Instantly Vaughn rips his from his head angrily throwing it down on the floor. Marshall looks up at him, pulling the chord from the headset up so it's back on the table.
"Damn it!" Vaughn's outburst is short as he quickly walks away from everyone, breathing heavily. His shoes beat on the floor making a loud snapping sound in the silence. The woman turns from Dixon to Will, taking a deep breath. And suddenly Vaughn comes storming back. "This is all his fault!" He loudly states, getting the attention of many people who have nothing to do with this particular mission.
"Vaughn!" Dixon scolds the man. But Vaughn doesn't hold back. He breathes heavily.
"He puts himself on these missions with his daughter! And what for? So Simon Walker can kidnap her? This is bull shit!" Vaughn continues his outburst, clenching his fists until his knuckles are white.
"Agent Vaughn, control yourself." Dixon's words are strong and harsh. Vaughn stares at him for a second before he angrily takes a chair pushing it forcefully across the room into the wall. The chair bounces back, leaving a noticeable dent in the dry wall and large chip in the paint. "Vaughn-"
"NO!" He yells, looking completely out of control. He yanks at his tie, and pulls it off hastily, because he can't think of anything else to take his anger out on. "Jack Bristow is fucking things up! He always has."
"Get her out of here." Dixon says to Will about the girl standing next to him. He nods. "Vaughn, in my office, now." His voice depicts his anger, sending chills through Will's spine.
"Come on Heidi." He says to the girl. The two then exit the large open room, and walk down the halls in the direction of their offices. They both walk silently for a few moments, as she continues to mess with the damp spot on her light blue blouse. She then looks up at him.
"Umm, Mr. Tippin-" He cuts her off quickly, holding his hand up.
"Please, call me Will." He's very gracious, smiling at her. And she nods.
"Yeah, see okay, well will you please call me Elle?" She questions. Will looks at her, confusing looming in his light blue eyes.
"Elle?" He questions. She nods, almost apologetically.
And she sighs, holding a hand out for a moment. She shrugs. "It's my name. Not, Heidi."
Will laughs quietly to himself as they turn down a different hall. "Heidi, Elle, same difference." She looks at him, confused.
"What?"
"Both models." Will answers, opening a door for her as they enter into a different area of the building. She shakes her head a little, eyes wide.
"Of which I am not..." She laughs, making the mood light. And Will appreciates it. He then takes a deep breath as they enter the common area of the offices he and the four working below him share.
"Marshall will have those tapes ready for you to view later this afternoon." He explains, opening the door to her personal office. "Elle, this agent whom we... lost... is a close friend of mine, so I'm sure you understand the severity of the situation."
"Yes sir." She smiles, before turning and entering her office. Will nods, leaving for his own office.
Sark watches as Aiden stands from the table, walking over to the balcony doors. He opens them sending cold breezes running through the dining room. He stands there alone, smoking his cigarette he just rolled, and Abs looks up at Sark, sighing. Right now, the matter at hand is simply waiting - waiting to see how Simon does in Prague. Sark picks the bottle of paralysis inducing truth serum off the table, slipping it into his pocket. Steph watches him as he collects all the folders, walking to a small table on the opposite side of the room.
Allison sighs and reaches across the table, grabbing one of the many guns Steph placed on the surface when taking her jacket off. She then proceeds to take the weapon apart, counting the 14 round clip. She raises her eyes in the direction of Steph, who just takes a deep breath, sitting alone. Abs reaches over as well and grabs one of the knives. She holds the 10-inch dagger at its handle, letting the tip of the sharp blade balance on the beautiful wood table. She then begins to turn the knife, slowly, pressing into the wood, watching the small slivers of lumber curl out of the hole being drilled.
Destruction is one of the woman's favorite things. She likes to see the result of her destruction, and most of all enjoys breaking anything beautiful. She'll throw $100,000 vases on the floor to see them shatter. She'll burn priceless paintings. She hasn't really been able to destroy anything beautiful in the material sense lately - since she and Sark became intimate. Sark doesn't like it when she does this. He doesn't like to see her destroying his beautiful things. Though he does understand it. He can recall an occasion where they both spent an afternoon shooting priceless vases.
She's taken her rage out on him before - her favorite past time being ripping up his Armani suits. She's caused him to get five separate custom paint jobs on his Enzo due to her favorite knife running along the automobile. And he'll never forget the day she turned one of his most expensive bottles of wine into a Molotov cocktail. She even once threw his laptop out of a 4th floor window into a pool below. But most of all, she likes to destroy beautiful faces. Abs is brutal. Abs is dangerous. Abs is adrenaline.
And Steph is pain. The twenty-eight year old has been floating around the covenant and other organizations Sark has been affiliated with since she was in her late teens - never having finished school. But that didn't stop her from becoming what she is. She specializes in interrogation and torture techniques. This woman has interrogated Sark himself when the Covenant thought he wasn't working in their best interest. That's when he first got the real scope of her talents. From then on, the two became involved in a roller coaster of a relationship. He truly respects her talents and the pain she embodies. She is by far one of his favorite operatives he's ever worked with.
Her talents are immeasurable. She's a chemist, and spends a lot of time creating her own brews for torture. She actually helped McKenas Cole enhance the 'Needles Of Fire' he likes to use in interrogations these days by extracting oils from the pulps and seeds of the hottest peppers in all the world. It took her a few months straight, but some how, she made them better than the man he originally received the evil acupuncture devices from. He now calls her his little 'Mad Scientist', or his personal favorite title for her: The Devil's Alchemist. He tells people she sold her soul in exchange for a Chemistry set when she was a preteen. She is Cole's favorite operative as well.
Sark watches as Steph stands and walks to the balcony where Aiden is still smoking. Aiden. Sark scoffs at the name and the man he knows by it. He's known Aiden for longer than he likes to think about - having met him when Irina was training him. And it's not that Sark doesn't like Aiden, though he does, but it's that they're basically rivals. They're pretty much the same age, both being in their early twenties, and on the outside they both have and embody the same ambitions.
But on the other hand he does respect the man. Aiden is probably the smartest man he has ever met in his life. He thinks, as the Americans say 'outside the box'. The words and thoughts from the man are amazing, intriguing and oddly stupefying. He is well read, cultured and philosophical. He seems to retain a brilliant amount of information, and also uses it as his most deadly of weapons. And so ultimately, even though he does not like Aiden as much as he should, he still admires the man immensely.
He watches the way Steph takes a slow long drag off of Aiden's cigarette. She then rubs her hand along his back, letting her fingers trail his spine, whispering into his ear. The two come back in from the balcony, shutting the 10-foot doors with them. They then, with out speaking to anyone, exit the dining room, heading down the hall for one of the many bedroom suites. Sark exhales heavily, watching Abs continue to drill a hole into the insanely expensive table.
"Abigail, must you do that?" Sark asks sighing. She woman looks up at him, stray hairs falling into her face. She stares straight into his eyes as she continues with the knife. "It's not good for the knife, darling. Let the table alone." He instructs. And she lets her eyes widen, then glare at him while she presses the knife harder into the wood. More and more curls of woodpile around the spinning blade. He can feel passion begin to burn in the pit of his stomach, pressing his lips together. "Destruction is not flattering on you." He finally states. And she smiles, biting her lower lip. She stops the knife, keeping his eye contact as she takes her right index finger, bringing it to the sharp blade. His eyes widen as she rubs her finger along it, slightly grazing a small cut into her flesh. A drop of blood begins to roll down the blade.
Suddenly Sark's cell phone rings, breaking their eye contact, and Abs laughs, continuing with her knife-play against the ebony wood. He retrieves his cell phone from his gray suit pants (which match his gray suit jacket and light blue shirt), pulling it to his ear immediately. He's not sure why he opted for so much color since almost every other person on his team has decided to go with black. "Yes?" He asks into the phone, knowing exactly who it is.
"Hi," Lauren's soft voice states. He can't help but smile at her sudden lack of arrogance and attitude following their last contact. She's just so easy to mess with.
"Hello, love." He responds. He watches both Allison and Abs scowl in response, before he walks away from the two women to pour himself a drink. They're all so easy to make jealous. Easy to mess with, easy to bother. His harem can turn into the cattiest bunch of women at the drop of a hat.
He hears Lauren laughing on the other end. "They're panicking over Bristow's capture." She states. He can tell she has a smile spread across her face; red lips contrasting with pale skin.
"Precisely as we want them to do." He answers. And in a sudden surge of interest he asks, "When am I going to see you again?" Abigail and Allison give him matched looks of anger, their mirrored animosity, making them compatriots, sisters in a moment beyond the color of their skin and Sark wonders which one will refuse him tonight. Both perhaps.
Lauren grins, "Considering how the CIA is reacting, probably fairly soon." Sark laughs to himself as he finishes pouring the expensive Brandy into a glass, then swirls the alcohol, letting it warm by the heat of his hand. "I'll see you later."
"Not if I see you first, love." As Sark shuts his cell phone off, Allison laughs, giving him a disapproving look. Abs stabs the dagger into the expensive table, almost violently - the way she's promised to stab him some day. He watches the way the two women both stand. Abs loudly slams her chair into the table, pushing it in. And Allison shakes her head, exhaling heavily. Both women exit the room one after another, disgusted in his comment to Ms. Reed.
The brisk night seeps into Jack's body, turning his blood to ice water in his veins. He and Weiss swiftly run down the street with flash lights and guns drawn, searching for any clues about where Simon Walker disappeared to with his daughter.
"Son of a bitch!" Jack yells, and Weiss runs over to the older man. They both discover the car Simon and Sydney were in, the back window shattered from Jack's bullet. And they walk around to the driver's door, opening it. A man is slumped over at the wheel, blood and brain matter spread across the inside of the windshield like an impressionistic painting.
Weiss pulls the cell phone from his pocket and calls Dixon to inform him of their discovery. Jack walks around the car, looking inside it. He finds the pearl necklace, and picks it up, slipping it into his pocket. He continues to investigate the vehicle, when Weiss walks over. "We have a plane to catch to LA," He states. Jack nods, before he kicks a wheel of the car, cursing.
Sydney struggles from Simon Walker's tight grasp as they switch to yet another vehicle. This time it's an SUV. She elbows Simon in the gut, but he doesn't falter a bit, continuing to hold the gun to her head. He then throws the woman into the black Mercedes Benz. She hits her head on the opposite door, before sitting up. "How the hell are you alive?" She asks, growling.
"Seems as though Daddy Bristow is sloppy." Simon smiles, rubbing his hand on her knee. She jerks away, once more hitting her head on the door.
"Pig tails!" Sydney looks up to see McKenas Cole in the passenger seat, turned smiling at her. "So good to see you again." Sydney jerks about as Simon binds her hands behind her back. "I'm glad you dressed up for this occasion."
"Go to hell!" She yells. The car has already started and they're speeding out of Prague once more. She kicks at Cole, who just leans back, laughing slightly. McKenas smiles, then reaches down and touches her smooth leg. She jerks away from his grasp.
"I wonder if I could get that kiss." He chuckles to himself, watching the loathe-some look coming from Sydney's eyes. He blows her a kiss, then licks his lips. She spits in his direction, but he moves just in time to miss the saliva that lands on the inside of the windshield.
Simon raises his eyebrows in response. "I've kissed her." He grins. "She's good."
"So who wants to take bets on how long it will take the CIA to meet our demands?" Cole asks. And Walker laughs, putting his gun away. "Pig tails? You know them best. You have the advantage." He states. Sydney's eyes are a constant glare, still trying to move.
"I am not a negotiation piece - I am an agent of the United States Government!" Sydney growls. "They will not meet your demands." Her hair falls in her face, and Cole leans forward, brushing it out of her face. She tries to spit at him once more, but he pulls his hand away in time.
"Knowing your father, they will." He answers, sitting back in his seat.