Alternate Termination

Sequel to Alternate Existence and Alternate Infatuation. Sydney and Michael finally had a perfect life. A real family with no lies. Friends who knew the truth. And then they lost it all.

Chapter 7: Baby Sister

Disclaimer: No, Alias is not mine. Nor is Sydney, nor Vaughn, nor Irina, nor Jack, nor Khasinou, nor Kendall. But Jeffrey is! He's all mine! No touchy!

A/N: I know I said before that I didn't like the Spanish name I'd used for Vaughn, but I changed it. I like the name I'm actually going to use. I do. I just love it. I'm going to name my first born child this, because I just get this image of an adorably scruffy little boy, and Vartan tends to kinda have this scruffy image going from time to time…but anyway. Here we go. No, wait one more thing. Vartan has a movie coming out May 6th! A romantic comedy that looks like its going to be hilarious. And now back to our regularly scheduled programming.


Vaughn noted at once the strange black sedan in front of the out of the way apartment building. Barely outside of Mexico City, people came and went all the time. But few drove shiny new cars with only a thin layer of red dust covering it.

He shifted his gun from the small of his back to his hip as he got out of his own dusty gray pickup. He'd spent the day eliminating any tangible paper trail left by them. Not because they were leaving, but because they didn't want to. They were…well, not happy, exactly, but content here.

He left his dusty black Stetsonwhich went without saying with the faded jeans and red flannel shirton his head as he skulked along the cool hallway to leave his hands free.

He could hear people, talking in low voices. It was unusual for this building after dark. These were hard working people that woke early.

Vaughn pushed open the door, gun in hand, to find Sydney blocking his from entering, putting herself in the door and holding it so that he couldn't see past her.

"Put it away, Mateo," she said softly, stepping out into the dim hallway with him. "We have company."

"Company?"

"Sà. Mi padre es aquà."

"What?"

"I found him when I got back this morning. He told me there was an attempt to get mi niñ o."

"Is he okay? Jeff, Misty, are they…"

"Inside," Sydney interrupted. "Jeff agreed to go into witness protection, for Alex. Mi padre got them sent here."

"Inside!"

"All of them." Sydney smiled a small, still disbelieving grin. "Eric, Dad, Jeff, Misty, Alex and Emily…"

"Emily…Misty's…" Vaughn trailed off and forced past Sydney into the door, his eyes wide.

The four adults sat around the living room. Misty and Jeff sat side by side on the sofa, Weiss sat on the arm of the sofa, and Jack sat stiffly in a high-backed wooden chair. The children had long ago been tucked into the bed in the single bedroom.

For a long moment, Vaughn just stood there, wide-eyed, with Sydney standing behind him with a hand on his shoulder. Nobody moved.

"May be we should go inside, Mateo," Sydney finally said, leaning up to whisper in his ear.

"Yeah," Vaughn said slowly, stepping just far enough inside for Sydney to slip in behind him and close the door.

"Mikey!" Weiss said, the first to launch himself from his seat at the new arrival. He caught his best friend in a bone crushing bear hug. "Man, it's you! You guys are really here!"

Misty flew up to hug Michael and kiss his cheeks. Jeff hugged him quickly, and everybody was talking, and the noise was so loud that nobody could really hear. Misty cried, and Sydney cried some more, and Vaughn even saw Weiss swipe furtively at his eyes a few times.


Alex rolled over, his sleep disturbed. He could feel his baby sister tucked in next to him in the bed. He was comfortable, but it was too warm, as if the air itself was heavy.

He turned over again restlessly, kicking at the sheet. He heard voices. Lots of voices.

An' Missy. Unka Jeff.

He flopped onto his back and opened his eyes to stare at the ceiling.

Unka Eric. Gampa.

Mommy.

Daddy!

Alex opened his eyes wide and pin wheeled his arms to disentangle himself from the covers, twisting to make sure he hadn't upset Emmy before leaping off the side of the bed. He skidded into the hall in his socks and ran into the living room. He paused in the doorway, trying desperately to search out his daddy in the swarming group of grown-ups.

Vaughn saw his son before his son saw him. Standing there in the doorway in blue sailboat pajamas, his wide eyes confuse and frantic.

"Alex."

Vaughn's low voice stopped all the chatter instantly, and Alex's eyes snapped to his face.

"Alex!" Vaughn said again, breaking the spell and rushing toward his son.

Alex ran forward and met Vaughn to be scooped up and swung through the air and held close.

"Daddy!" Alex squealed.

"Alex, I missed you so much…" Vaughn said, crushing his son to his chest.

Emily began to cry, having discovered herself alone, and Alex immediately wriggled away from his father.

"Son, why don't you let Misty check on the baby?" Vaughn asked curiously.

"Emmy's my baby sister," Alex said. Then he stopped and turned around, wrinkling his forehead. "Isn't she?" He looked from his father, to Misty, to his mother, to Jeff.

"Of course Emily's your baby," Misty said, kneeling down by him and putting a gentle hand on his arm. "Let's go get her so your daddy can see her, okay?"

Alex smiled.

"Okay." He held Misty's hand and pulled her toward the bedroom.

Vaughn looked at Sydney to see her shaking her head.

They had a problem. Alex was going to be one confused little boy by the time the adults around him sorted out their places to him, let alone when he tried to sort them out for himself.


Syd slipped into the kitchen in the dark in the dead of night. Everyone else was finally asleep, but Sydney couldn't sleep. Her son's confused expression haunted her. All she wanted was a glass of water, then she'd go back to bed before she was missed.

"Syd?"

She jumped at the voice coming out of the dark.

"Jeff! God, you scared me…what are you doing?"

"Same as you. Not sleeping." Jeff shrugged. "I'm just a little…this was your life, Syd. All this isn't supposed to happen…"

Sydney touched his arm and motioned to the door that led out onto a tiny patio. She didn't want to wake Misty, who was asleep on the couch, or her father, who dozed in the armchair, or Weiss, who'd been as game as Jeffrey about a pallet on the floor.

"I understand how you feel," Sydney said. "Like crazy stuff like this isn't supposed to happen to you."

There was a moment of silence in which both took in the cool night that seemed to envelop them and separate them from the people still inside.

"I'm worried about Alex," Jeffrey finally said. "He's lost. He…Syd, you know Misty and I would never want to replace you and Michael, but in Alex's everyday life, we did. Miss and I were his parents."

"I know," she said again. "Vaughn and I both knew what we were doing when we…left. We didn't want Alex to not know who he was or where he belonged."

"Some parents we made," Jeff muttered.

"No, Jeffrey, don't think that. I had no idea Arvin Sloane would come after Alex, there's no way you could have. You had no choice. I'm glad you did what you did."

There was another long stretch of silence, and Sydney crossed her bare arms across her chest against a slight chill that came less from the breeze than an internal chill. The sounds of crickets and other night creatures reached them. A lone coyote howled in the distance.

"Your mother tracked us to the LA safe house," Jeff said suddenly.

"What?"

"She was there, right in the kitchen with us, before we even knew it," Jeff said regretfully. "She said Khasinou is dead."

"Why in the hell does she think she can ever show her face?" Sydney raved. "She knows as well as I do that I'd have shot her seven years ago, and I'd do it now!"

"She didn't go anywhere near Alex," he said quietly. "She claimed she could protect him from Sloane, but she didn't try to get near him."

Sydney paced away, off the patio and into the night, and back.

"I always drew a line," she said calmly. "Between Laura Bristow and Irina Derevko. Laura Bristow was my mother. Irina Derevko was an evil woman, a woman that, by the time I was nineteen, I more often than not wanted to kill her where she stood. From the time Jessie was killed, I progressively saw less of Laura Bristow and more of Irina Derevko. I like to believe that there's still a tiny bit of Laura Bristow left in that woman that might really want to keep my son safe." A small smile crossed her face.

"I hope you're right." Jeff paused. "She was…for just a second, when she talked about you, I saw her before we found out everything."

Sydney watched Jeff, and could almost see him remembering. Carefree lives, when their biggest concern had been not getting a table at lunch. She could see it…Jeffrey, with a huge goofy grin on his boyish face, teasing Jessie, who couldn't even feign being mad at him without a grin escaping…

"She's a dangerous woman," Sydney snapped, pulling herself out of what was fast becoming a painful memory. "This is how she pulls you in. I've seen her do it a hundred times, working together for the KGB. She gets you to trust her, to believe in her basic human kindness, then she gests what she wants and smashes it all."


Hehe…I just love that speech, don't you? I can just see Irina leading some hapless fellow to trust her, then, like, shooting him…And I love it! What do ya'll think of Vaughn's Spanish name? I love it, too. I just love this chapter. Review and tell me you love it too!