"Just get it done," Hope screamed into the phone before slamming it down. She was tired of working with such stupid peons. She had a job to do, and they always seemed to be getting in her way. She was being groomed to take over this organization one day soon, and she didn't want to show any sign of weakness. People couldn't just walk all over her.

Rubbing her hands through her hair, she sighed and contemplating whether she could escape from the office without anyone noticing.

"Trouble, darling?"

Hope turned to smile at her aunt who hovered in the doorway and shrugged. "Two of our agents are being real pains-in-my-ass. They think that my orders are flexible. They're fairly new."

Nadia laughed and sat down in the chair next to Hope's desk. "Then it will be no problem to kill them. New agents are easily replaced."

"Ha ha. Very funny." She threw the pen in her hand down onto the desk and leaned back in her chair. "So what brings the big boss down to my humble abode? I haven't done anything wrong in the past few days to necessitate a visit."

"Your mother's trying to rescue you again, Hope. She is relentless in her search to win you back."

"She has the right to try."

"You don't want to be rescued?"

Hope shrugged. "The past couple years with you have been the easiest ones of my whole life. No stupid prophecy to worry about. No people to avoid because they could possibly kill me in some vague, distant future. I just wake up in the morning, do my job, go to sleep, repeat. It's refreshing."

"You know this all would be a hell of a lot easier if you didn't insist upon writing your parents once a week," Nadia said with a smile.

"I'm not going to write them out of my life. You should understand how important it is to keep your family close to you. You never had a family, and look how you turned out."

"Very funny," Nadia said, rolling her eyes and standing up. "If you weren't my niece, I would personally see you dead for a comment like that."

"I'm your protégé, too."

"A choice I regret at least once an hour."

Hope shook her head. "I still have no idea how you convinced me to work with you."

"You were nursing a pretty horrible broken heart, kiddo. I just offered you a place to get away for a few months. You're the one that chose to stay."

Hope nodded. She really had only intended to take her Aunt Nadia's offer of escape for a few months until the pain of cutting Tyler Vaughn out of her life got better. It wasn't like she was oblivious to the fact that Nadia showing up on that plane two years before meant that she had broken out of CIA custody. But the offer had been so tempting.

Nadia would be living a fairly quiet life for the first few months of her newly-acquired freedom. Hope figured she could just stay with her, and then when the pain got better, she would go back and tell her parents what a horribly, stupid mistake she had made. Actually, it was more like a series of horribly stupid mistakes starting with the acceptance of that shady telephone offer of employment and ending with her failing in love with the man whose only destiny seemed to be kill or be killed when it came to her.

The pain hadn't gone away, though. So she postponed her return for a few more weeks. Those weeks stretched into months which stretched into years.

Now she was settled in and didn't want to leave. Nadia might have been going about things in the wrong way, but her heart seemed to be in the right place. Hope could sense that.

And she really had no idea how her parents would handle her sudden return.

"I've got an itch, Nadia."

"Oh, the itch. God! Doesn't it feel good?"

"Not an itch to kill," Hope said, rolling her eyes.

"Oh. Then what kind of itch?"

"The kind that should have those two newbies shaking in their points." Hope gave her a wink as she stood up and walked out of the room with a cocky grin plastered across her face.

"She has become hell on wheels," Nadia said with a laugh. She reached across the desk to pick up the phone. "Conners, I need you to stop my sister's little inquiries into our business. I'm tired of having to hide Hope from her. And make sure you dispose of those stupid letters she writes her father better. I think she might start to realize that they're not getting sent out. Take them back to your room and burn them for all I care. Just don't let her know about it!"

Nadia sighed and sat back in the chair. It was so hard being evil.

"I'm getting too old for this," Sydney grumbled quietly to the man walking next to her as they made their way up to the twenty-ninth floor.

"This is the best lead we've had on our daughter in two years, Syd."

"I know." She smiled demurely as a few people passed them by. "I still don't want to believe my sister did this."

"She definitely got her father's genes."

"I could kill Sloane for still screwing up my life even when he's been dead for years. The bastard's hurting me from the grave."

Sark squeezed his wife's arm lightly and pointed towards a room on their left. "Take a deep breath. We've already made it so far. We found out that Hope's been working for some shady organization."

"Which begs me to wonder for the millionth time why we didn't see through her 'I work at a bank' cover. It was so simple."

"We both didn't think she could possibly be lying like you had done yourself in your first few years as a spy."

Sydney took a seat at the computer terminal and started typing away. "This system is way too easy to hack. It isn't Nadia's work."

"This is just a splinter cell with little to no contact with the big boss. It's not going to be that good. Security will be loose, but that means we don't have to shoot anyone. No shooting is always good."

"Got it!" Sydney yelled, thrusting her fist into the air in glee. "Nadia's been holding her in… oh god. She's in Mexico. That's so damn close."

"All right. We'll put in a call to Jack and Irina. With a little back-up on our side, we should have Hope back within the day."

"Do you think that Nadia's hurt her?"

Sark gave her a sad smile but shook his head. "No. Your sister might have her priorities slightly skewed, but she's not a bad person. Hope's blood to her. Plus, I think keeping our daughter safe but out of your reach hurts more."

"Sometimes I find myself glad that Nadia took her. That maybe she's finally gotten a reprieve from the prophecy that's ruled her life. My psychotic sister has managed to give her the one thing I've always wanted her to have. And I know at least Hope's safe, I guess. "

"That's completely warped logic."

"You're right," Sydney said, popping a disk out of the terminal and storming out of the room. "I think I'll just kill her then."

"No, you're not," Sark whispered to himself, cleaning up the evidence that they were ever there. "But that's why I love you."

Tyler dropped his bags just inside the front door of his parent's house in Fiji. He hadn't been back here to see them or Jim in over a year. Sometimes it felt like every part of his life was just pointing out the mistakes he had made. Everything was so damned caught up in this prophecy.

"Is that you, Ty?" he heard his mother call from the kitchen.

"Yeah. My plane landed early. Something about a good wind out of the north."

Lauren walked into the hall and smiled at him. "You look good. The CIA's treating you well."

"Try to say it like you really mean it," Tyler said, rolling his eyes as he gave him mother a kiss on the cheek.

"You know that I always hated the idea of you following in our footsteps. You already have enough stress to deal with without worrying about going on missions."

"Mom, could we please not talk about that damn prophecy?"

"All right, all right." Lauren held up her hands. "No more prophecy talk."

"You started in already?" Michael Vaughn said with a laugh as he came in through the back door. "I thought I told you to play it cool so that he wouldn't run away screaming."

"I was trying, Michael. But he's my son. I'm worried about him especially with the new developments."

"New developments?" Tyler said, giving them a funny look. "What new developments? And why have I heard nothing of these new developments?"

"I thought you didn't want to talk about," Vaughn pointed out.

"I didn't want to talk about it if nothing had changed, but since you seem to think something has changed, then yes, I want to talk about it."

"Well, it's about Hope Lazarey."

Tyler tried to stay calm. He knew in talking about the prophecy, they would be spending a lot of time talking about Hope. Or Ana, as he still thought of her. "The woman that's supposed to kill me?"

"Or you could kill her," Lauren said. When both her son and her husband shot her a look, she shrugged. "I like to think positively even if it's slightly morbid and screwed up. Sue me for not wanting my only son to die."

Tyler let out a laugh. "So what's going on with Hope?"

"Well, she's dropped off the charts."

"What?" he felt himself practically yell. "What do you mean she's dropped off the charts?"

"About two years ago she was on vacation in Belize and she never came back. Everyone's been keeping it quiet."

Tyler suddenly remembered her cover story during the time she spent with him in Paris two years earlier. Oh god. She must have disappeared right after they broke it off. He tried to shut out his thoughts as he focused on what his parents were finally telling him. "Don't you think you should have included me? I could have done something to help."

Lauren gave him a funny look. "Her parents have been trying to locate her. That should be enough for now, honey."

"She's been gone for two years!" Tyler screamed. "She could be in danger as we speak, and no one seems to care."

Lauren and Vaughn exchanged a look out of the corners of their eyes. "Am I missing something?" Lauren asked finally.

Tyler let out a sigh and walked into the living, sitting on the edge of a chair and placing his hands in his head. His parents just let him sit there as they hovered around the door, wondering what had just happened to their son.

"Ty?" Vaughn said after a few minutes.

"I love her, Dad." He looked up and gave them a small smile. "I know you think I've been holding stuff back from you the past few years, and you've been right. Only it's not what you thought. I met a girl in the field. Her name was Ana. I fell in love with her. It was quick and hit me hard. I asked her to marry me."

"What?" Lauren screamed as she stomped into the room and took her own seat in a chair, head in hands.

"Like I said, it went fast."

"And why did we never meet this girl?"

"Because the day I proposed, she told me her name wasn't really Ana."

"Hope," Vaughn said with a laugh. "She must take after her mother with the good aliases."

"Don't joke right now," Lauren warned.

"She must have disappeared later that day. I should have known that she wouldn't just drop off the face of the earth completely."

"So you fell in love with the girl who's going to kill you?" Vaughn asked.

"Or that he's going to kill," Lauren said through her hands which were still securely covering her face.

"I did. And now she's in trouble." Tyler stood up. "Tell me how to get in contact with Sydney and Julian Lazarey. I'm going to help them find her."

Vaughn didn't say a word. He just grabbed a piece of paper off the coffee table and wrote down a number. "This is Syd's cell. Just call her and explain as best you can. She'll welcome your help."

"Don't you think they're going to be a little weary of mixing the two halves of the prophecy together?" Lauren asked as Tyler grabbed the paper out of his father's hands.

"Syd's always loved playing with danger. That kind of thing never changes." Vaughn looked over at his son. "So I guess this means you're not going to be sticking around Fiji?"

"I have things to do. I promise to keep you up to date," Tyler said, shaking his head as he walked out of the room.

This life was getting to be a little too much with its twists and turns.