Chapter 6: 'Spada Di Filo' And 'Waster'

Spada di filo – a sharp sword.

Waster – a wooden blade used for the most fundamental practice only, useless as a cutting weapon.

In the briefing room at the L.A. branch of the CIA, Assistant Director Kendall held forth on the very recent 'Caplan' kidnapping.

At least two people in the room weren't giving their full attention: Agent Sydney Bristow and Agent Michael Vaughn were instead exchanging coy glances. After the CIA takedown of SD-6 the pair had finally, after a year of skirting about it, 'gotten it on'.

The third person not paying full attention was Sydney's father, Agent Jack Bristow – he had caught the tone between the two agents and was a man suddenly aware that his only daughter was sleeping with the man sitting next to her - someone he considered to be beneath her. He may have once used Vaughn's services in getting Sydney out of the hands of the CIA's own Rambaldi obsessives, but that didn't mean he had ever truly respected him.

Jack was fully aware that Michael Vaughn would only ever be a washed out copy of his father, Bill Vaughn. He knew that Michael Vaughn had only entered the CIA to follow his father; if Bill Vaughn had been an electrician, would Michael Vaughn now be wiring plugs?

Sitting across from Jack, Vaughn was unaware of the other man's deepening dislike of him. Instead he looked over at the daughter again and dipped his head and tried to hide his smile of genuine warmth; he and Sydney were finally together. Vaughn experienced the inner glow he got at the start of any new relationship, at that point when he realised that the person he had wanted, wanted him too. He didn't know how some people could go through life without having someone at their side; well, now he had Sydney.

"So," Kendall wound up, "Sark has the Caplans. Seems that tweaking the CIA's nose is becoming Mr. Sark's favourite sport."

"Nah," spoke up Agent Weiss, rock solid field agent and friendly with Vaughn, "Sark's favourite sport's mindfucking, everyone knows that."

Kendall stared Weiss down. Vaughn cringed and tried to pretend he wasn't sitting next to him.

As the meeting broke up, Sydney frantically signalled Vaughn to go after her dad. The night before they had discussed breaking the news of their relationship to her father and had both decided that he would respect Vaughn for being the one to tell him. Well, Sydney had decided it and Vaughn had gone along with it. He didn't exactly feel easy about taking on Jack Bristow, but he didn't want Sydney thinking that he couldn't stand up to her father. As he caught up with Jack, Vaughn fixed a smile to his face, moving to straighten his tie: time to have that 'beer on the front porch' talk.

Jack turned to see Vaughn's grin and wasn't sure whether he felt his heart harden or sink. Jack was a man who was unwilling to show his emotions, he wasn't even sure if he was willing to have them. The woman he had married, Sydney's mother, Laura – no make that Irina - had seen to that, but here Vaughn was, obviously aiming to have 'a talk' about Sydney. Even if it were necessary, were the time and place really appropriate? Torn between distrust and distaste Jack looked down into the eyes of the younger man and saw what was always there: fear.

It wasn't even an honest fear, something out there and openly admitted, but some slithering secret thing that lived at the back of Vaughn's eyes, and it was always there. It was the first thing Jack had ever noticed about him and the only thing he had ever really needed to know – that the guy was permanently scared. Scared of failure, scared of retribution, scared of somehow being 'found out' as less than he pretended. Jack reflected that on missions Vaughn could dress up in black leather jackets and go unshaven all he liked, but no tough-guy pretence could ever wipe out the anxiety in those eyes.

Looking up, Vaughn's rehearsed words deserted him as he flinched beneath Jack's stonewall gaze.

"Well … I … Mr. Bristow … ." Vaughn stumbled and started again. "Jack – I'm sure you realise that Sydney and I … I - "

"I have a meeting with tech support in five minutes. Whatever you want to talk about, are you sure there's time for the discussion now?"

Vaughn's gaze wavered. Weiss had joked earlier, 'What's the worst that can happen, he beats you to death in public?' Maybe Weiss hadn't been joking about the 'beating to death' part? Looking over Jack's shoulder, Vaughn caught a glimpse of Sydney standing across the room, grinning and nodding encouragement. A few feet away from her Weiss was giving a hopeful double-thumbs up from behind his desk.

Shit, thought Vaughn, I can't even back out.

He dug for an upside. Okay, if he did it now then Jack's imposition of a short time frame might be an advantage, it meant this had to be over with quickly, however it went, right? He shifted his gaze back to Jack and pressed the re-set button in his head. Perhaps it would be best to pursue the line of professional integrity – how their involvement would not let Syd down on missions, stuff like that? He swallowed slightly.

"Jack, I understand you must have concerns and I - "

Jack felt his mood slide from stonewall to basilisk. So despite his heavy hint that he decidedly did not want this contact, Vaughn still wanted to talk? Very well then, they'd talk. Jack's voice cut across the younger man.

"Mr. Vaughn, you aren't evolved enough to understand my concerns." Vaughn pulled up short, his eyes widening. Jack continued, "nevertheless, I shall attempt to communicate them." Jack spoke smoothly, almost conversationally, letting his words alone do the damage. "Mr. Vaughn, I want you to be fully aware that you are a man – no make that a 'boy' - who is just not good enough for my daughter."

Vaughn's face involuntarily coloured as he as was swept by a mix of disbelief, embarrassment, and, underlying it all, apprehension. This definitely did not reflect the conversation he had planned out in his mind.

"I don't appreciate men who lead women on," finished Sydney Bristow's father.

Vaughn fought down a sense of inner vertigo. Lead women on? What was Jack Bristow talking about? He looked about him uneasily. Didn't the man realise they were in an office? Was this really the time and the place?

"Mr. Bristow," Vaughn he backed off from using Jack's first name – that had obviously been a mistake, "I'm sorry, but I have not lead Sydney on."

"I'm talking primarily about Alice Weston."

Vaughn was stunned - Alice? What did Jack have to do with Alice?

Jack carried on. "You do still remember her, don't you? The woman you'd been 'seeing' but whom you conveniently 'dumped' the moment my daughter became available? What was Alice to you by the way, your second string choice in case Sydney didn't pan out? Fuck-buddy insurance in case my daughter didn't come through? After all, no need to dump the girl you've got until you're sure you can get the next one, right?"

Jack's rat-a-tat string of questions was an attack designed to get Vaughn on the defence. It worked. Vaughn mentally reeled backwards, completely unprepared. Vaughn swallowed hard and forced himself to meet Jack Bristow's gaze.

"Mr. Bristow, I know how it looks - "

Jack saw no reason to even let him speak.

"How it looks is how it is. For a year you've been playing two women, leading my daughter on and for much of the time not telling her you were seeing someone else, whilst keeping Alice Weston attached without intimating that your eye had already wandered elsewhere. You were quite happy to continue doing just that until mere days ago when you were confident that my daughter was available – by the fact that she was wiling to play 'tonsil-hockey' with you amid the remnants of SD-6."

Vaughn flinched. This wasn't fair! That wasn't how things had happened. It wasn't like that. He wasn't like that. He held up an admonishing finger – just hold it big guy – until he saw Jack Bristow toying with just how to snap it off. "Mr. Bristow, you're just not being fair!"

Jack was surprised at how angry he suddenly was. This screwed up little pisher was trying to defend the indefensible? The man couldn't even see what he'd done that was so very wrong? Something tightened in his chest. "That is your reasoned argument Mr. Vaughn? 'It's not fair'? I haven't given credence to that element in debate since I left the schoolyard."

Vaughn wished he could control the slight rattle in his voice. "Look, Alice and I were already through, at heart our relationship was already over."

"Really? Did she know that?" Jack stared the younger man down hard. "I've checked the woman's household bills - "

"What? Is that legal?"

" - and as of ten days ago she was still out shopping for bed-linen for the two of you, so excuse me if I don't share your beliefs." His gaze flicked over the younger man's face with disdain. Vaughn felt as though he'd been spattered with acid. "And I'm CIA Mr. Vaughn, I don't 'do' legal." Jack took a half step forward and Vaughn felt a sudden movement in his inside jacket pocket. Jack had taken his cell-phone. Vaughn suddenly felt horribly vulnerable - for a big man Jack Bristow was terrifyingly quick. "Shall I call her to get her view?" Jack indicated the phone in his hand, "or have you already wiped her number off your speed-dial?"

A stunned Vaughn could think of nothing to say – he tried to get the colouring in his face under control, and couldn't.

Jack continued speaking. "The fact is, Mr. Vaughn, that telling me your relationship with Alice Weston was 'already over' in no way excuses you. Because if it was over, why hadn't you ended it at some point previously? Either you're lying and it wasn't over, or you are telling the truth and you are a man who'd rather have anyone at his side than no-one at all. You were causing Alice Weston to waste her time on you, while from the comfort of what you already had you looked for something better."

"You've got me all wrong. I wouldn't do a thing like that. I'm not that kind of guy!" Vaughn's voice was a scattershot of outraged hurt.

"You did do a thing like that and you are precisely that kind of guy."

"Mr. Bristow, irrespective of whatever you think of me - "

Jack was caught between scorn and pity at the younger man's self-evasions. He cut across him ruthlessly.

"Whatever I think? Stop kidding yourself. There is no doubt what I think, I've made it clear: you are a weak man who is afraid to be alone, and in your selfishness you think it's a fine thing to deceive others." At these words Jack felt some emotion crunch up inside him, he ignored it, refusing to even look to see what it might have been or why he might have felt it. "Not only are you not good enough for my daughter Mr. Vaughn, but I can hardly think of whose daughter you might be good enough for."

For once Vaughn was desperate enough to not be diverted, his voice had an undertone of yelping injustice that made it sound almost boyish. "Whatever you think of me I am in love with Sydney and she is in love with me. I would never hurt her."

"Of course you wouldn't – she'd kill you." Well, Jack hoped she would.

"Mr. Bristow, I did not two-time those women!" Vaughn felt compelled to defend himself. He was a man who loved having a partner, yes, he knew it. He was a man who didn't like to be alone, couldn't bare it in fact and he knew it, but hell, still … "I am not a cheater!"

"No, of course you're not. You're just a man who 'trades up'."

Jack's statement reverberated between them.

Finally run out of self-justifications Mr. Vaughn?

Jack's face reflected this thought, but not the others he was having, not the ones about how disappointed he was in Sydney. He'd never voice those thoughts, certainly not to Vaughn, and, he realised, there was no-one else to whom he could voice them.

Jack didn't 'do' friendship.

He didn't see the point of it. For him it was just a pale imitation of love, one involving a string of endless obligations in exchange for a very tepid reward.

He'd overheard the office gossip a few days ago. 'Vaughn's dumped his girlfriend and taken up with Sydney Bristow'. He heard about Sydney's reaction to Vaughn telling her he'd just broken up with Alice – that of a huge grin. He'd not believed it until he'd viewed the incident privately on office surveillance tapes. There was his daughter, splitting a grin as broad as a slice of melon at the news that an underpinning of another woman's life had been kicked away without warning.

Jack's bitter reverie was interrupted by Kendall's appearance. The pugnacious departmental senior packed Vaughn off to a Strategic Analysis seminar and Vaughn was grateful to go. Jack made his way to Technical Ops.

His slow stride gave him time to contemplate.

When he'd viewed that tape showing his daughter, his sense of let down and shame had been enormous. Shame and let down not just at Sydney but also at himself, at witnessing yet more proof of what a truly inadequate father he had been. Couples split up under difficult circumstances – he knew that, he had cause to know it more than most – but in a triangle was it too much to hope that the reaction of the 'victor' should reflect some adult acknowldgment of the cost to another? Despite her much vaunted empathy, Sydney's instant reaction had been a display of thoughtless glee.

He sifted it over in his mind. What could he say? That in some ways his daughter was immature? That she was volatile and could be high-handedly judgemental? That at times she clung to an almost childish certainty of right and wrong, of black and white, with not enough room for grey? Or could he say that things would have been different if only she'd had her mother for the emotional guidance that mothers did best and that he had not done at all?

And to choose Vaughn as she had, a man so beneath her! Jack reflected that Sydney always had been a poor judge of character. As he walked through the doors of Technical Ops, he thought of all the years of deception he'd suffered with Laura Bristow and supposed Sydney had inherited that particular flaw from him.

Sydney and Weiss quickly cornered Vaughn to ask how it had gone.

Vaughn couldn't disguise the fact that he was still breathing heavily from the conflict. How could he play it? He loved Syd, he didn't want her knowing her old man thought he was trash.

"Well, he didn't actually threaten to kill me," he joked, his light tone hiding how near to the bone that was.

Weiss visually checked him over. "No contusions, no major trauma …" he shrugged, "hey, you lived, I'm impressed." He turned to Sydney, "no offence Syd, but your dad's a big dog with a bad bite."

Sydney laughed in relief, dimpling her cheeks. From Vaughn's reaction it had obviously gone well; she re-phrased that to herself – it had gone as well as it could have gone, after all, they were dealing with Dad.

It was only a while later that a bruising conversation with her father revealed just what Vaughn had meant when he'd mentioned the 'not threatening to kill me' part.

Vaughn had been telling the literal truth, but he'd conveniently used 'truth' to disguise reality.