Sydney sat down at their kitchen table with a cup of coffee grasped in her hands. She had been on the phone with Marshall for the past two hours, telling him why his wife had been killed and explaining why all the blame should rest on her shoulders alone. There must have been an apology coming out of her mouth every other second. Marshall, as she knew he would be, was understanding, although she could tell he was crumbling on the inside.
Eventually, she told him that he should get back to his son and start to heal his wounds. She didn't want o keep him from Mitchell. The only reason he agreed to hang up was that Weiss had just arrived at his house. That was Sark's doing.
He had somehow had the smarts to call Weiss once they had returned to their house. He made sure that Connelly was safe in the CIA's custody and then explained what had happened to Carrie Flinkman. Weiss immediately agreed with his idea that Marshall should not be alone and handed the Connelly situation over to Vaughn. It reassured Sydney to know that Marshall would not be alone for quite a while.
After taking another small sip of her coffee, she set it down and stared at the man sitting across from her. "All right, handsome. Talkie talk talk."
"You want to know how I knew you needed me?"
"Yes. And don't give me that connection mumbo jumbo."
"I think my memories are coming back. I remember the meeting I had with Connelly when I asked him to run surveillance on you right after you got abducted by the Covenant. He knew who you were."
"I'm sure he did. I was quite popular back in the day."
"The funny thing is my memory proceeded past the moment that I left the meeting. I heard things that I never should have been privy to."
"Have you been smoking the evil marijuana again?" she teased.
"I wouldn't be telling you this if it wasn't important, Syd."
"I'm sorry. I'll be serious. What did you hear?"
"Connelly wanted me to fall for you so that he could hit me where it hurts. Once I had let you in, he was planning on killing you. All in an attempt to get me to work for him once more."
"See, he kept telling me the opposite when I was kidnapped. He seems to be interested in having me work for him. The descendent of Milo Rambaldi is a valuable commodity these days."
"Only two of its kind," Sark joked.
"And you've only tainted one." Sydney got a funny look on her face. "Oh have you? Did you ever meet my sister?"
Sark just grinned at her.
"I am going to kill you," she said, moving to get up. Sark beat her to the punch and rounded the table, pulling her into his arms. Sensing something was wrong, she asked, "Why so serious?"
"We can't be bantering back and forth right now, Syd. There's a lot we have to get to the bottom of, and I think that between the two of us, we have the information to do it."
"Okay," she said, shrugging out of his arms. "Who do you think Connelly told the truth to?"
"I'm not sure. I wouldn't doubt that he was using me to establish a connection to you."
"But you also wouldn't doubt that he was using me to destroy your life and effectively turn you back to the dark side?"
"Exactly."
She paused and bit her lip. "Thought. What if he was telling both of us the truth?"
"How do you mean?"
"Go with me here. He gets you to fall in love with me, the 'evil' Covenant agent. That effectively lowers both of our strongly erected emotional barriers. We're weakened. Without your knowledge, he goes to Julia Thorne to let her know that the man she's sleeping with is actually intent on killing her. I decided that he must be right because you are aloof and distant with me every time I ask you questions. Connelly is supportive and lets me know that he's there to help. After planting some fake evidence of your intent to kill, he tells me that he'd be happy to whisk me away from the Covenant in return for my services as Rambaldi descendent. I agree because you are so shady that I can't trust you even to check up on Connelly's credentials. I do whatever job he needs and then BAM! He whacks me. Your life is destroyed. He's again supportive and comforting, and you go back to the man who is familiar to you like a father."
"Crazy plan. But it does have Connelly written all over it. He has a flare for the supportive and comforting angle."
"So, what do we do now?"
"Beats me."
"Do you think I should tell Nadia's what's going on? She might be in danger if Connelly figures out that she exists."
"I don't know. You have only talked to your sister a handful of times since you yourself found out she existed. I'm not sure if it's the easy thing to keep calling her up and telling her that her life is in danger because she belongs to a family she never knew."
"It's tough, being my mother's child," Sydney pointed out. She took a long, deep breath before looking back at Sark. "So do you think I should contact her?"
"I don't know." Sark paced for a few seconds before turning back to her. "I don't think you should. At least not yet. Don't contact her until you know if there really is something going down that could affect. And there is the favor that Connelly was going to force you to do."
"The meeting with the President of Lithuania? You actually want me to go through with that."
"It might give us some much needed information and let us know if you have to talk with your sister about Connelly. Worst case scenario, it would at least give us leverage against Peter. I mean, all you would have to do is talk with this guy, right?"
"That's what it seemed like. Of course, you'd come with me under some silly guise of being my bodyguard. The information I find out will affect you just as much as me."
"And I do need to protect you in case Connelly gives the CIA the slip."
"I can protect myself."
Sark rolled his eyes and sat down at the table again. "And that's how you ended up in an inescapable room with no way out."
"Hey! I was escaping when you kindly stepped in to break my rib."
"How is your rib doing?"
"Hurts like hell, but I've had worse. You've done worse to me yourself."
"Back at you." Sark reached across the table to pick up her mug and looked at the bottom. "Want me to get you more?"
"No. I probably shouldn't be hopped up on caffeine right now. It throws off my senses."
"Planning on getting abducted again?"
"It's a pattern that I choose to not ignore. I'm kidnapable." She shrugged her shoulders.
They both returned to silence as they thought over whether this was the right move to make. Losing their heads and rushing straight into something might be the worst choice they've made so far, and there had already been a few bad ones.
