DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the characters, except for the original ones. And I will not blow up any of the original characters. I will kill them, but not in that manner. Thank you and have a nice day.

A/N- long chapter ahead. Sorry… midterms are next week, and I might upload chapter 14 the day before the first day of examinations. Thanks for the reviews :-D

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

It's been three weeks since he last saw Irina, Jacob and Ana. And three weeks since Sark escaped. The CIA has traced him in Zurich a few days after, but they lost track of him after three hours. He's very much like Houdini, except that he don't do magic.

Jack sighed as he thought about Sark's escape route. The Covenant blew a hole in his cell and almost revealed to the tax-paying citizens that the CIA is holding terrorists in the middle of LA. They could have just put a sign that says THIS IS WHERE YOUR MONEY GOES.

He opened the newspaper and began reading the news. A lot has happened ever since he and Sydney left Panama. A week after they went away, Anya Ivanovnich struck again, this time assassinating the leader of a jihad group in Islamabad. He's quite sure that Ana's earning the ire of both Islamic extremists and the Covenant, and frankly speaking, he's afraid for her safety.

Jack was drinking his coffee when an obituary caught his eye.

Laura Donahue

22 March 1951- 30 July 2004

Panama was where her heart used to be.

When she saw LA, she never looked back and stayed.

She was survived by her husband, Johnny and their four children, Cindy, Nadine, Arrianne and Jake. Please pray for her soul.

'Creative. Why did she put her message in the obituaries?' Jack thought as he set aside the mug and took his laptop. She uses the name Donahue when she sends her messages in his e-mail.

There was one message in his mailbox. When he opened it, he saw a series of numbers. A code.

He deciphered it and when he read the message, he felt that it was time for him to tell Dixon who Anya Ivanovnich really is.

HELP. CALL. BRITAIN. ANA

-x-x-x-

"Anya Ivanovnich is the Protector?!" Dixon asked Jack.

"Yes."

"And you're telling me this just now, because…?" Dixon asked again. They were the only ones in his office.

"If I told you that Anya Ivanovnich was the Protector, you would have immediately sent a team to where I was and take her to CIA custody, not to detain her, but to keep her safe and make her work for the Agency. I doubt if that will make her cooperate because for one thing, she sees me as an enemy," Jack said remembering the antagonistic atmosphere Ana creates whenever he's around.

"And second, you will be tearing her away from her family." Jack continued as he leaned on the chair.

"Family?" Dixon asked, raising a brow.

"Yes. Aside from having a mother, two aunts and three bodyguards, she also has a six-month old brother whom she adores so much and which she is fiercely protective of." Jack answered, watching at Dixon's reaction.

"Baby brother…" Dixon repeated and looked at Jack inquiringly. "Jesus Christ!" he exclaimed when Jack only cocked a brow.

"Jesus Christ indeed." Jack said and looked at him. "I was informed that the Covenant took her. I have the coordinates." He said and gave him a folder. "Sark's there too. If you agree to let me head this operation, you can hit two birds with one stone."

"Pick the people involved?" Dixon asked. Jack gave a nod. "You're ex-wife?"

Jack didn't answer the question directly. "Anya Ivanovnich also has a mother who has a maternal instinct of a sabretooth tiger." Dixon doesn't know whether that was a compliment or an insult to Irina Derevko.

"Go ahead. You have the operational control of this mission." Dixon answered after a few minutes of thinking about Jack's offer.

"Good. Sydney, Vaughn and Weiss. My… contact will handle the rest." Jack said and stood up from the chair.

Dixon watched as he walked away, thinking about Sark's slip up.

'Hmm… so that's what he meant with four children…'

-x-x-x-

Weiss and Vaughn are sitting on the sofa, in the living room of Irina's chateau, with Byron, Francis and Dante looking warily at them.

"It's a big house." Weiss whispered to Vaughn. They are also looking at the three men with suspicion. "Where did Sydney and Jack go, anyway?" he asked, looking around the room. He feels comfortable here, and he doesn't know why.

A few minutes later, Jack and Sydney went in. Sydney walked towards Vaughn and sat beside him. Irina followed them a few seconds later.

"You okay?" Vaughn asked when he saw Sydney's face. She looks a bit confused.

Sydney smiled and at him and nodded her head.

"Francis, Dante, Byron, relax." Irina said when she saw her three friends glaring at Weiss and Vaughn. She set a baby monitor on the coffee table, but it looked more like a walkie-talkie to Vaughn and Weiss.

"Are you sure we could trust them, signora? What if they tell the CIA your location?" Dante asked.

"They won't. I'll chop off their heads before they do that." Another voice answered. It was Katya.

Sydney felt Vaughn's body tense. She instinctively took his hand and squeezed it, letting him know that she's there for him.

"Don't worry Agent Vaughn. I'm not going to stab you. If I had the intent before, you should be dead by now." Katya said when she saw Vaughn's anger in his eyes. She approached Irina and stood by her side.

Irina looks tired. She feels tired. And she's angry at herself. She could have stopped The Covenant from taking Ana, but she wasn't able to.

"Ana, as you all know, has been taken by the Covenant. It has been confirmed that she is being held in Volgograd, with maximum security." Irina said in an impassive voice.

"The Covenant wants Anya Ivanovnich to work for them. They tried to kidnap her before, but she escaped. They tried again, and this time they want to make sure that she won't get away again." Katya said, continuing for Irina. She knows her sister is acting tough, but the attempt is draining her energy.

"They kidnapped her before?" Vaughn and Jack asked simultaneously.

"Yes. I kidnapped her." Katya replied.

The CIA agents gaped at her. Katya looked at Irina and just shrugged.

"How did the Covenant get to her this time?" Jack asked. Irina didn't explain this part to him or to Sydney.

"I gave her too much freedom."

Katya, who was looking at Vaughn at that time, turned to face her sister. "Irisha…" she said softly and went to Irina. Irina blames herself for Ana's abduction. She always blames herself when things go wrong for her children. 'Sometimes,' Katya thought, as she placed a comforting hand on Irina's shoulder. 'It's not a healthy thing.'

"It's true Katya. I gave her too much freedom. If I just stood my ground that day, she wouldn't be missing." Irina said.

Ana was still angry at Katya for what she did and when she saw her mother and the hated aunt talking like nothing happened, she got so angry that she burst into tears and went out of the house. Irina wasn't able to explain that Katya was bugged at that time and had no choice but to act treacherous.

It was Katya who gave Yelena her coordinates. It was Katya who helped Yelena infiltrate her cell. It was Katya who cut off the power in the building.

Ana went to London. She has a flat there. Irina asked Dante to look after Ana until her daughter's temper cooled off.

But a Covenant contact ID'd her as Anya Ivanovnich and they proceeded to convince Ana to work for them. When Ana didn't cooperate, she was kidnapped. Dante was hurt in the process.

"When do we move?" Vaughn asked.

"We'll be leaving in three hours." Jack replied then turned to Irina. "What about Jacob? Who will be with him?" He asked. Everybody could hear the concern in his voice.

"Yelena will be with him." Irina answered.

Vaughn looked at Sydney inquiringly. Sydney gave him an 'I'll-tell-you-later' look. Weiss was also wondering who Jacob is, but kept his mouth shut.

Suddenly, they heard a baby crying. Vaughn and Weiss, who were both surprised, looked at Sydney and then to Jack.

"Excuse me." Irina said and hurried out of the room. Jack followed her. Katya took the baby monitor and shut it off.

"Why don't we discuss the mission?" She said sweetly, almost saccharine, to Vaughn and then motioned to Byron, Dante and Francis to come closer.

A few minutes later, twenty minutes to be exact, Jack and Irina returned.

"Is Jacob okay, mom?" Sydney asked. She wasn't able to see Jacob when they first arrived because Irina explained what Katya was doing in the premises.

"Yes. He's still nursing a fever." Irina answered. Katya handed back to her the baby monitor.

"So, shall we review the extraction once again?" Katya asked and they evaluated the whole mission, once again.

-x0x-x0x-x0x-

Weiss and Dante led their twelve-man team inside the building. The whole infrastructure seems shabby and deserted but it was actually well equipped with state of the art surveillance systems, which are one of the problems they had encountered during the pre-ops phase. Sydney and Vaughn had taken care of that problem and the security team of the Covenant is now watching a looped feed.

"This is where we separate." Dante said to Weiss. Weiss nodded and together with the chosen five, turned left in the corner.

Francis gave him an evil eye when they heard Katya that he will lead the other twelve man team, together with Dante. It didn't occur to him that Dante and Francis might be gay. Never in this lifetime would ever cross his mind that those two muscular, manly-looking guys would actually be homosexuals.

'Good thing Sydney told me what their… sexual preference are or else I will be forever mystified by that look.' Weiss thought as he and his team positioned themselves in the specified location. They crouched and kept quiet, alert for anything.

"Retriever, are you in position?"

"Yes, Black Eagle. We are in position.

"Good. We'll be coming from the back, as planned. The subject's being held in the fourth floor of the building."

"Roger that."

The minutes passed.

Five minutes…

Ten minutes…

Fifteen minutes…

Twenty minutes…

Weiss looked at his watch. It's taking longer than expected.

"Retriever, take your team and leave the facility now!"

Weiss recognized the voice as Katya's. "What about Black Eagle, Mountain Hawk and the rest?" he asked.

"THEY'LL BE UP. JUST GO!"

Weiss felt the urgency and helplessness in Katya's voice. He had no choice but to call Dante and to tell him that the situation.

"Cleaner? This is Retriever. We are being ordered to pull out. Inform the Magician of the change in plans."

"Copy that, Retriever. Will also inform the Tooth Fairy."

-x-x-x-

[A little before the scene above…]

The room is dark and the only light that can be seen is at the middle of the room. There is a spotlight shining on The Covenant's captive.

"I can see her. She's at the center of the room." Irina said to Jack, who was at the end of the line, as they crept to the fourth floor.

"What do you mean you could see her?"

"I think it's a trap. She's sitting in an aluminum chair." Irina replied, her voice, cracking a little. She could clearly see Ana from where she is positioned. She was bound to the chair and her face is so bloody. Her mouth is plastered with duct tape and her blue shirt is stained with blood. "They've anticipated our move."

"Do you want to take the risk?"

"I want to. But we can't. It's too dangerous."

Suddenly, the half room became bright with lights. The agents were temporarily blinded with the intensity of the lights. But they are still camouflaged by the darkness that reigns on the other half of the room.

Then, a voice reverberated around the area. Both Jack and Irina recognize the voice as belonging to Mckenas Cole.

"Welcome CIA agents. We've been expecting you."

Irina tensed. 'Damn. Did I trust the wrong person?' she thought. Maybe Jack really intended to catch her and entrust her to CIA custody, let Ana die and get Jacob. 'Stop it Irina. You're getting a bit paranoid.' She thought as she frantically look around. There were no armed guards beside Ana.

"Looking for Anya Ivanovnich too? Too bad. We've already squeezed all the information we needed from her pretty head."

Just as then, about thirty armed men appeared. And then, Mckenas Cole came into view.

Jack silently ordered the men to separate and ready for an attack. He will take the chance of rescuing Ana.

"Boy Scout, we need back up."

"Copy that, Black Eagle."

Irina watched as Cole stroke her daughter's hair. 'Bastard!' she thought to herself and instinctively stepped forward, revealing her position

"Irina, no!'

"Ah… a brave soul." Cole commented and took his gun. "Murder is not really my number one thing. But I'll give it a shot." He said and gave Irina a toothy grin. He doesn't recognize her. He only sees a person, most probably a CIA agent, wearing an all black outfit, a black mask, carrying an AK-47.

He motioned to the thirty men. The goons proceeded to surround Irina.

"Hmm… what can be a nice line? Oh, I know." Cole muttered. Then he stood by Ana's side and pointed the gun at the temple of her head. Ana gave a muffled sound and then closed her eyes.

"Goodbye Anya Ivanovnich. See you in hell."

A loud gunshot echoed around the room. It was followed by a savage scream.

Jack realized that Cole shot Ana and Irina was the one screaming.

"Dad, what's happening?"

"Mountaineer, we need back-up." Jack said frantically signaled the men to cover Irina's back. Irina started to shoot everyone who comes in her way while Mckenas Cole ran away.

"Brown swallow, order the others to pullout NOW!" Jack said and rushed forward to help Irina.

Irina is bleeding but she doesn't seem to feel the pain. She ran towards the center of the room, gunning everyone down. The men that draw close to her seem to drop like flies when they get shot.

'This can't be true. She's alive, goddamit! She's alive!!!' Irina thought, blocking the sounds in the room.

Sydney and her team came barraging in the room a few seconds later and was surprised that her parents didn't need back up. Everyone seems to be dead.

"Where is she?" She asked to the group in the middle of the room. When they heard her voice, the circle broke into two and Sydney witnessed the second most horrible thing she has seen after Danny's murder.

Irina, who took of her mask, is kneeling near the aluminum chair and holding Ana's bloody hand. Her father is standing beside Irina. Jack took off his mask and is holding a rope. His face looks grim.

Ana's dead.

---

A/N-hehe :D