A/N: WOOHOO! Update time! Anyways... Thank you so incredibly much to Jasmine and Demon who beta'd. I really like this part... so... yeah. Oh.. and thanks to yumytaffy for her persistence. And a note to self (and to those of you reading The Epic of Gilgamesh): Noses don't come out of worms.

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You stare at the cover of the file, and expel a sigh. Weiss had scrawled, "Catherine Stepankov," on the front in black ink. What will the file bring? You don't know exactly, but you do know that it'll either let you move on or bring another disappointment. You hope it's not disappointment, yet if you bring it to chance, it won't be happiness. Earlier, you told Weiss that you thought Catherine was going to have the answers you need, but in reality, you aren't that hopeful. It was just a ploy to make Weiss believe you're doing okay, that you feel like you have a chance of moving on. However, the world has been disappointing you ever since you lost Sydney. You wouldn't be surprised if it did it again.

Holding your breath, you open the thin file. A short note from Weiss is blocking the rest of the file from your view. You move it aside without reading it. It was probably a "good luck with finding what you need" note anyways. It isn't something you need to read—at least, not for now.

The first thought that comes to mind when you see her picture is that she's around your child's age, if your child had lived. Your eyes close automatically. You're not sure if you can do this. It's almost too hard just looking at a picture. You had repeatedly wondered what your child would have looked and behaved like. Would he or she have looked more like Sydney or yourself? In all your dreams, the child would have had Sydney's eyes. They were always warm and expressive. That's what you loved most physically about Sydney, her eyes. You had hoped that it would have been passed down to your child. Would your child have been a great ballerina or a hockey player? Would he or she have a wild streak in them or be a mellow person? Would you have been a good father? Stop thinking about what never happened.

You open your eyes and force yourself to read the biographical data Weiss provided. October 3, 2001, her birthday. How ironic that it was two days after you met Syd. If someone is orchestrating this, you have a feeling they're doing a damn fine job making you doubtful and uncomfortable.

Her driver's license photocopy has her listed as having gray eyes and curly, light brown hair. Both of which are evident on the picture you saw. She graduated from UCLA and received honors, majoring in Law and Society. Before her third year at UCLA, she had a six month intermission with the FBI. The file listed that she lived in Maryland for that period and the things she was taught while in the internship, as well as the other interns who participated. Nothing panned out though. There is no current or former connection between any of the interns and any major crime syndicate. The realization that there was no connection during this time worries you. You're not sure how to take it. If it were that she had had connections to a syndicate, you would know that the chances you are headed in for a probable let down is much higher. But with so much innocence on the page in front of you, you're still unprepared emotionally.

Keep reading. Focus, Michael. You need to do this for Sydney. Concentrate. Don't let your mind wander otherwise you're completely useless—again, you tell yourself. Self-pity always did something for your perseverance, whether positive or negative.

Catherine, during the internship, met a man named Jonathan Ambler. They dated for three months before she returned to UCLA to continue her studies. In her third and last year, at UCLA, she was pregnant with Ambler's child. She was a single mother at the age of 20. But it seemed like having a child didn't slow her down, she applied to several law schools, and decided on Columbia law. This only serves to remind you of Sydney. Sydney used to work non-stop, at least until everything was completed otherwise she felt like she was never doing her best. The pain of thinking of Sydney returns, and you force yourself to concentrate.

During Catherine's two years at law school, she once again excelled at what she was doing. She married in her last semester to Jonathan Ambler, the same man who is the child's father. Apparently, she decided not to change her last name. Ambler is clear of any wrongdoing other than a few traffic violations when he was in his early twenties. He is working with the FBI in the Hoover building. Catherine has been working in a law firm in Virginia. Their home is in Maryland, which is where Catherine instructed you to go.

You look at your watch and realize that you should be approaching Dulles airport pretty soon and should start packing up your files. You are more than a bit disappointed that Weiss didn't find anything of value for you. Maybe you are beginning to get paranoid—it's not an unlikely fact. You've always been suspicious of people and their possible ulterior motives, and even more so ever since Sydney died. You had begun to think and act like Jack for a brief amount of time before you realized that Sydney wouldn't have wanted you to have lived such a dispassionate life. Not like you have a life now anyways.

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You unpack your suitcase in another nameless hotel room. One of hundreds you've stayed in around the world. Before arriving to your room for the night, you had decided to waste time walking around on the streets to get yourself acclimated with the East coast. You had walked past many houses and parks along your way before you finally arrived back at the hotel.

You go around doing your daily nighttime ritual: stripping down to boxers and tugging on a white t-shirt, flossing and brushing your teeth, and turning down the covers. Reaching over to the lamp by your side, you flick it off, and slip under the covers. You feel like you're waiting for something to happen, but you don't know what it is. It might be an end to your wary soul-searching journey, although, you've been searching for that for a while now.

You want to know why she had to go. It couldn't have possibly been her time. She had so many things unfinished. You shake your head. You don't want to return to the image that Kendall had so tactlessly described to you. It's been haunting you for more than twenty years and you feel like it has to stop now or you'll go insane. Stop thinking about her. Stop thinking about her…

With those words in mind, you let yourself drift to other subjects. Did I turn off the bedroom lights when I left the house today? I'll just check when I get home. It's raining at home. I hope the newspaper won't be soaked. Will it rain tomorrow here? What was the house number I have to be at tomorrow? Oh yeah. House number 452, third on the left on Maple Lane. It should be a nice suburban area for a new family. Are the maple trees… Your thoughts are lulling you to sleep. As you're on the brink of wakefulness and sleep, you feel a dip in the bed next to your body. You jerk yourself up a little too fast; you feel the blood rush in your head and see bright spots in your sight before they blink out like twinkling stars.

"What the hell?" you exclaim unconsciously. The sound is absorbed into the thin walls.

Orientating yourself, you look around and don't see anyone there. You crawl out of bed and take out your handgun that you've kept with you after your days at the Agency. It is the same gun you used to kill Sloane. In your mind, it's your lucky gun; it's saved you when you were on countless missions with Sydney and those when the Alliance collapsed. It calms your nerves when you feel the familiar weight in your hand and against your calluses. Recently, you've come to think of it as if Sydney is guiding the gun and making sure you remember everything from your Agency days.

You cross the room, your back against the wall, and snap the light switch to the on position. Like you feared, you don't see anyone there. Your move along the walls—"Keep your backs away from the enemy and unguarded open areas!" your defense instructor had always yelled—and peer into the bathroom. You find it empty. You start to wonder if you imagined it all. No one is in your room. Your eyes pass over the plaque on the back of the door, which you instinctively know as the emergency fire route map, past the jumbled letters of the newspaper on your bedside, and rest on the diaphanous curtains. The gossamer threads are torn on the left curtain, which prompts you to check them. You're not sure if it's the result of the maybe intruder or if they were from a previous occupant.

"Who's there?" you say as you approach the curtain. You don't spy feet where the curtains touch the ground, which makes you very certain that no one is there. You shake the cloth anyway just for the sake of doing something and not feel helpless. Like you thought, there is no one there. There is no one at all in your room. You go around the room and check all the windows and doors once more, locking one window in the process.

You sit on your bed and wonder what just happened. You're almost sure you felt someone sit down next to you while you were sleeping. You play with the gun in your hands. Back and forth from hand to hand. You're not sure if you can trust your sanity. The fact that you were so sure that someone was there keeps you in check. You may be getting old and paranoid, but the keen sense you need as a spy tells you that you're perfectly sane. You don't know who, but that's almost irrelevant. You no longer sense that anyone is there. A few minutes later, you place the gun down in the bedside drawer and pull the covers back over your body. You need your sleep if you're to talk to Ms. Stepankov with a clear and focused head tomorrow.

Tossing and turning, you can't seem to find a perfect position to sleep in. You finally give into a habit you picked up years ago and take the extra pillow and hug it. You thought you broke that habit a few months ago, but the need to feel someone next to you is overwhelming right now. Hoping to fall asleep, you rest your cheek on the pillow.

This time, when you feel the bed dip next to you, you don't react. You're not sure why. But for some reason, you know no one is there. The hand pressing down on your hair and playing at the nape of your neck isn't really there. You do know that it's comfortable and relaxing and you want it to last forever because you know Sydney is there once again. Right next to you. And her presence pacifies any qualms you had.

"Hey."

"Hey," you feel a breathy voice in your ear.

"What are you doing here?" you murmur in a sleepy voice.

"Watching over you, silly," she says in a teasing tone. It's playful; something you wish you took more time cherishing when the both of you had been together in the warehouse. She presses a kiss into your hair, and then another on your forehead. "You know, you have too many worry lines now. They almost resemble the sand dunes in Arabia."

"And whose fault is that?" you reply, falling back into your almost forgotten lighthearted banter.

Her fingers glide over the wrinkles. It's as if she's trying to massage all of them out individually. As she does this, you feel more relaxed than you've been in a long time.

"Vaughn," she draws out your name after a moment of silence, and you can't remember it ever sounding so nice. "You need to take care of yourself."

"I am, Sydney. I'm alive, aren't I?" You try to drag her out of her more serious tone of voice. You know it was futile from the start.

She's quiet for a long time. "Are you, Vaughn? I'm not so sure anymore. I haven't heard you laugh in so long."

"That's because there's nothing to laugh about, Syd."

"That's not true, you laugh when you're with me," she states quietly.

You think for a minute, "If only you can be with me everyday."

"I try, Vaughn. But sometimes, I feel like you need to let go. It's better for you to let go."

She's asking you to do the hardest thing you'll ever have to do. And you know that you're hardly ever capable of resisting her, but this is one thing you know you have to deny her. "I can't do that. You know it, too. I just can't. I'm not ready." Her hands continue to smooth out the wrinkles. "You know I love you, right, Syd? And that I wish I could say it to you again and again and again."

"Of course I do," she answers immediately. "And you know I love you, too. But I want to see you happy."

"I want to be happy. I just don't know how anymore. It's been too long."

"Exactly, Vaughn. It's been too long since you've been happy. And you know it's bad when my father is even worried about you," she quips.

"Jack? Why would he be worried?" you ask. You're much more awake now, but you're afraid that if you open your eyes, she'll disappear. You roll yourself over and leave the pillow. You face her and move your arms in front of you, trying to locate her. Once you do, you hug her around the middle and breathe in.

Her fingers, which had been idle for a few moments, start threading themselves through your hair. "Because he knows you've changed a lot. Because he's afraid you're turning into him."

Your arms squeeze her a little tighter. "The truth is I'm afraid I've already turned into him." You take a breath and realize you need her to hear this because in doing so, you'll be hearing yourself out as well. "I surround myself with students everyday, and yet I have a hard time dealing with just the mere thought of children. Because if I think about it, then I fully grasp what it is I lost. And I don't want to face that again. So I try to avoid the subject whenever I can. And instead of thinking of my students as college students, I think of them as… I'm not sure. I just can't think of them as students otherwise it makes me think of small kids. And when that happens… I just can't think about it. Now, I feel like Jack because I have to be so cold about everything. I have to block myself from so many things because they remind me of you. And why I think about you, I get depressed. I want you to come back home."

"Have you ever thought about speaking to Weiss about it?" she offers comfortingly, sidestepping your last sentence of your monologue. You both know it couldn't happen.

"I can't, Syd. He has kids. I don't want him thinking I hate his kids. Besides, with you around, why would I need to talk to Eric?" you joke.

It falls flat at the seriousness of her tone.

"Vaughn…"

Sometimes you feel like when you're talking to her, you're in actuality talking to yourself. She's the side of you that makes you wonder if what you're doing is the right thing. Not exactly a conscience, but something that resembles it.

"I know, I'm making this difficult." You both fall quiet again, just relishing in each other's company. You reach up and tug her hand, "Come here, I want to hold you."

You feel the covers lift up and Sydney slide in under them. You move your arms back around her. Her face is resting on your chest, and her body is right next to yours. You can't remember the last time you felt so whole. You love the feeling of having her next to you. She makes you feel happy and peaceful. The tension just flows out of you.

"So what are you doing here, Vaughn?"

You know she knows the answer, but you'll do anything to hear her voice again and again. You can feel the vibrations in your chest when she talks, and she no doubt feels it when you speak.

"I'm just following another lead, Syd. Isn't that what I'm supposed to be doing? I want to find out what happened to you," you whisper to her sadly.

"Stop it. You need to live for yourself. Even though I wish I could be with you all the time, I can't now. But you need to keep going. That's how it works. You need to move on. You're not living anymore. I never wanted to see you like this. I watch you, and you're not the same man I originally fell in love with. I still love you, but you've changed," she says almost harshly.

You pause before you respond. You don't want her to get angry, otherwise she might leave. And then where would that leave you? You'll be alone again. "I promise I'll move on once I find out why, Syd. I need it. Why won't you tell me?"

"I can't, Vaughn. It's as simple as that. I just can't."

You feel her eyes on your face and you have to resist yourself from opening your eyes and ruining it all.

"Then I don't think I'll ever be able to move on. I've searched for so long, trying to figure out what happened in Manila. I'm afraid I'll never find the answers I want."

"Hmm… that's where you're wrong. This is the end of the journey Vaughn. This is where you're going to find all your answers. I know it. And I know you'll believe it sooner or later." She moves her hand up and touches your chin, rubbing her thumb over the cleft on your chin. It tickles. The memory of her doing this before is almost too much for you. You want to see her. Instead, you draw her even closer to you and bury your head in her neck.

"How do you know?"

"Because this is where it all ended for me. And I think you'll be more pleased by the outcome than you originally thought after you sort it all out in your head."

You know you have a quizzical expression on your face. She chuckles. "What do you mean?"

"Shh… You need to sleep now." You start to feel yourself drifting back asleep.

"But I don't want to sleep. I want to be with you," you slur.

"Liar. Go to sleep. I'll be right here." She hugs her arms around you, and you continue to hold her as well.

"I love you, you know," you force out, afraid you won't be able to say it for a while.

"I know. I love you, too."

You feel yourself fade out into sleep.

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You wake up in the morning feeling more rested than you have for weeks, and look around the room. No one's next to you. In fact, the pillow you thought you had been hugging at one point during the night was lying perfectly unwrinkled and seemingly untouched on the other side of the bed. You get up and look around. The gun you know you stored next to the bed was not there. You look around the vicinity of the drawer. Twenty minutes later, you give up and look in your suitcase. It's where you packed it when you left for the trip.

You don't understand what's going on. Finally, you came to one conclusion. It was all a dream. Only, this time, unlike the other few times, it's probably because you're anxious to meet with Ms. Stepankov. And you irrevocably comprehend that this time along with the other times in the past six months can't be chalked up to coincidence. You need to figure out why you keep dreaming she's next to you at night. Because after these dreams, you find yourself wanting to escape back into Sydney's arms and to never leave the dream world you've created.

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Pulling up to 452 Maple Lane, you stare at the modest cream-colored house. This would have been the type of house I would have wanted to share with Sydney, you think. You see someone glance out of the curtain and realize you should get out of the car and knock on the door. You're five minutes early.

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tbc

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Thank you to Fair Cate, Genevra, Jandl, Valley-girl2 (x2), Aquarius4, Fanatic707, Forceful, Monkey47, and purplefuzzfor their awesome reviews.

Thank you to purplefuzz, monkey47, and genevra for adding me to their favorites list.

Thank you to Fair Cate, Aquarius4, and sunshine231 for adding me to their author alert list.

All of you guys have no idea how much that means to me.

Ooh.. I'm going to feel super guilty later today because I haven't replied properly to your reviews. I'm sorry. But it's 2AM and I'm desperately tired. Good night all. I hope you'll forgive me for not replying?