Alternate Infatuation
Sequel to Alternate Existence. We all know that certain people are simply destined to be together. When Syd finally gets out of the life of espionage she was drawn into at sixteen, how will she find her own destiny?
Chapter 6: It's All Who You Know
Disclaimer: Author does not own most of these characters. Said author does not wish to be sued. However, Jeffrey is all mine! This is also my original plot, and if anything resembling it ever shows up on Alias, I'm suing!
A/N: In the flying paper ball world of reviews, I have miraculously not been hit in the side of the head with too many during the course of this story. However, two from the last chapter caught me square in the face, and I have to respond to them.
S: Ew! Ewewewewew! No, none of that! I can't believe I'm even acknowledging that idea with a reaction! I willabsolutely NOT be using any of that...anything you may have interpreted as all that was only meant to show how casual they are with each other...ya know, no pretences and such...
Eyghon: Glad to see you again! This story is entirely hard core S/V fluff, but stay tuned! I'm currently laying out chapters for a third story, which currently sports the working title of Alternate End (which I don't like...), and all the Irina-Khasinou crap that I don't want to deal with will be in that one.
Okay. Now back to the regularly scheduled programing.
Agent Kendall stood across the desk form the director, who stood as Kendall closed the door.
"I gave her the locket back," Kendall said.
"Do you think she'll need it?"
"SD-6 will come back, and this time they'll be better prepared. She'll need it."
"That friend of hers, Lexington. He'll notice. She admitted when she resigned that he knew about it." The director's voice held a sense of foreboding not lost on Kendall.
"She won't come back."
"She will if SD-6 gets a hold of her a second time."
"So you speak Italian," Sydney said in polite admiration after Vaughn ordered in perfect grammar from the menu.
"As do you," he replied. "That shouldn't surprise me, should it."
"No. Nor should it surprise you if I speak Russian, or Romanian, or Chinese, Agent Vaughn."
The cheerful banter had serious undertones, but they both pointedly ignored them for a long time, managing to converse on more normal issues.
When the delicious looking pasta plates were served, Sydney tugged her locket from beneath her shirt. She played with it for a moment, then activated it and looked up at Vaughn with a half smile.
"Do you remember this locket, Agent Vaughn? You should. I was sixteen, naïve, and helpless. That was the first and only time we ever saw each other. You didn't see me later, after I'd spent a few long sleepless nights in the basement because of some horrible thing I'd had to do, or because I'd shot a man, or because they'd trained me in the water tank for the first time and I was scared senseless. I couldn't stay helpless. I had to learn fast, to be the best. I had to fool and lie to my own mother on a daily basis, who's now somewhere on this planet armed with the knowledge that I betrayed her. I'm not a helpless teenager any more, Vaughn, not for a very long time, and I won't let you look at me like I am."
There was a tense pause, and Vaughn watched as Sydney's eyes changed in a way that changed the very inflection of her next words.
"I'm an adult," she said, confidence filling her words. "Capable of making adult decisions."
Vaughn swallowed compulsively, trying to get his rebellious heart to wrap around the fact that this woman was way too young for him. He unconsciously leaned forward, and so did she, until an image of a defiant sixteen year old imposed itself over the present.
He sat back abruptly, pulling away his hands, which he hadn't realized lay over hers on the table.
"Sydney, we can't do this. Work and…and anything else never works," he protested as if she'd seduced him into that restaurant.
"I'm not your job any more, Agent Vaughn." Sydney was horrified by the sultry sound of her own voice, when she had, until that moment, been utterly insolent. "I'm not your job, but you're still here now," she said, an irresistible wanton smile playing across her features.
So few things to pack, really. It only reminded him that now that his friend had time for him, he had little time for her. He wished he could stay indefinitely. He and Sydney had talked for hours the night before, just like they had as kids. He wanted to get back to Chicago to see Misty before Monday, but as much as he felt for her she only knew who he was now, not who he'd been before or how he'd gotten here. That was special to him and Sydney, that knowledge of the past.
Jeffrey tossed one last shirt into the suitcase and reached to close it, but he found himself immobilized. An arm, he realized, had snaked out of nowhere around his neck. His neck! He couldn't breathe! Air! God, no! Who the…
"Dammit, Syd!" he wheezed right before he blacked out, knowing this unforeseen attack had something to do with his best friend.
When he woke up later, he was tied to a metal chair that appeared to be bolted to the floor.
"Who the hell are you?!?" he'd screamed at the first being he saw, who walked through the thick metal door and closed it tightly behind him.
Probably soundproof, Jeff thought glumly.
The man that smirked back at him had a ragged look about his clean-shaven face, as if he hadn't slept in a week, but his every move spoke of an acute awareness. A man who feared nothing and anticipated everything.
"Who I am," he said distinctly, his voice a low almost growl. "Does not matter. All that matters here is who you know."
Sydney was clearly the one the man referred to, but Jeffrey had seen enough spy movies not to be completely naïve. He'd give them hell, and not a damn thing they could use.
"I know no one of importance to you," he snapped.
An unexpected blow hit the side of his head, and his head snapped back with the force of the whack. He gritted his teeth against the pain exploding like fireworks in his head.
"I have all night," the man said, his voice calm and unruffled and infuriating, with an undertow of pure malice. "You, however, may not last that long."
Oh, poor Jeffy! I hate to do that to him, but it's so Sloane-like that I couldn't not do it!