Next part again sorry for the wait.
Sydney walked up the stairs calling for the young girl. She heard an answering call from the room to her left so she walked inside. She saw Zara sitting on the windowsill looking out at the city. She didn't turn around, she was playing with something in her hands.
Sydney looked closer and saw that it was a coin. It was larger and flatter than normal currency and Zara was just moving it through the fingers on one hand and the other was holding her necklace.
"Here" she said throwing the coin to Sydney.
Sydney caught it and looked at the pattern stamped into it. It said 'Best friends DT JT & ZT'. She looked closer and saw that someone had scratched on 'AT' as well at a later date.
"My brothers gave it to me as a birthday present but they couldn't find one that said best sister so they went with that" she said smiling slightly.
"Zara?" Sydney asked watching her hold the necklace with her bad hand "How can you even hold that?"
"Oh, I've got a chain around my fingers" she said pointing to it "I can move my thumb, little finger and to some extent my index finger but this makes it so that they all move together"
"Clever" Sydney said "When did you work that out?"
"It was Jacque, he was our tech really good with any engineering stuff and making something useful out of anything"
"He sounds like a useful guy to have around"
"He was like my big brother, he was really like James actually now that I think about it. He would always muck around with Edek and me, Shen would too"
She looked out of the window again. Sydney looked at her then at the room that she had chosen. It was easily the smallest one in the house barring the closet. Everything was neatly packed and folded it was as if she were ready to go at any moment.
She turned round as she heard footsteps coming up the stairs. It was Vaughn, he smiled at her then looked at Zara.
"Hey Zara the med services are here"
"Ok" she said getting off the windowsill carefully.
It was an hour later before the medics were finished, by that time Jack and Dixon had arrived and were waiting for Zara to reappear before getting the information from the thing. She did hand wrapped up the white bandages standing out from the rest of her dark clothing.
She walked straight over to the little thing and picked it up turning it over for a minute before pressing her thumb to one side. It opened and a small disk fell out.
"Have you got a computer or something?" she asked.
Dixon nodded and pulled out a laptop from its bag, switching it on. He made the other agents leave them. Zara put the disk in the drive. She waited for it to come up and then typed her way through what seemed like a hundred commands. Sydney and Vaughn sat watching everything intently while Dixon and Jack talked apart from them.
Zara sighed and smiled slightly at a message from Boom that he had encoded into it. She clicked on the file she wanted and a media program came up. Sydney called the others over to listen to it.
Zara enlarged the player to fill the whole screen before hitting play. They saw Lauren's file at the Covenant then heard Pa's voice speaking in Polish. Zara translated.
"She's quite high up in it, her mother is a benefactor as is her father although he doesn't know it. They've found a way for us to get her"
Her eyes lit up as she listened for a minute. She didn't speak again until the message had finished, several other pictures flashed up, most of which the others didn't recognise. Zara turned to them and explained.
"You know my assignment is theoretically to kill Syd" they all nodded "Well as Syd is a 'kiss ass spy' as you lot say, I going to need some help. I contact the Covenant and ask if there is any available trusted back up in the city. Hopefully they'll call in Lauren or Sark who will call her in anyway. Well from that you can set up a mole hunt, you've got to make known enough so that the Covenant will recognise it as a real one. Lauren will make contact with me and we will plan, I'll be bugged by Boom and the others who will give you a link to it. When we go to 'kill' Syd you can jump out and go, I've got you. Simple"
"Sounds it" said Jack suspiciously "What if Lauren knows about you?"
"She doesn't know one does, if they suspected at all I wouldn't even be allowed out of their sight and I'm under no surveillance now"
"How do you know?"
"Because I would know alright" she said staring at Jack almost angrily "I know who they are, how they dress, how they act everything. I was one for awhile and they're all the same. It is just grunt work, they don't have to be clever or anything just make themselves known" She took a second then said quieter "They send them to tell you to do a job or else they'll do it for you and drag you back to them to be killed. They trust me and don't have tabs on me most of the time if I ring in"
"When have you been ringing in?" asked Dixon
"Boom and Rainbow have taken care of it" she said.
"Do they keep tabs on her?" asked Vaughn
"No" said Zara after thinking for a second "I wouldn't think so it could compromise her cover"
"Good point" said Sydney "And we know that they don't really bother with Sark very much"
"If you want to talk about I more you'll have to meet them all at the bar at seven this evening" said Zara "I don't have to come so you can leave me here"
"Ok" said Dixon taking charge "Jack and I will go there tonight, from what you say they will recognise him, am I right?" Zara nodded "Well that'll give us passage"
"Trust me the place will probably empty within a few minutes of you walking in there Mr Bristow" said Zara "Trust me if I saw you walk into any place I was in before now I would have moved out and fast"
Jack Bristow actually cracked a small smile at that compliment and Sydney's mouth dropped open. Vaughn who was also shocked managed to pull himself together quicker and nudged her gently. She turned to look at him, it clearly said 'did you just see that?'. He smiled slightly and looked back at her, saying 'I know but don't show it'
Zara saw all this out the corner of her eye and smiled gently. She stayed seated as the adults formulated a plan of action. She answered questions that were sent in her direction and commented about how she thought things could be improved but other than that she stayed quiet.
It was decided that Dixon and Jack would go to the bar and Sydney and Vaughn would stay with Zara their cover was a mission to Canada to look for information on the North cell.
Zara spent the rest of the day being talked at by tutors and taking stupid test to she what levels she was at. The rest of them worked or at least tried to.
Vaughn was having a hard time concentrating and controlling the overwhelming anger he had inside him. He was even working on some of the files Zara had downloaded for him from the chip which were about Lauren's involvement and what she had done. He had just finished reading it.
He felt sick and shaky. He had married this woman, this he didn't even know how to describe her. He got up unsteadily and walked out determinedly to the men's bathroom. He hurriedly pushed the door open and got into a cubicle before throwing up several times. He was dry retching when he felt a hand on his back.
He shrank away from it for some reason.
"It's ok"
They held a cup of water out to him which he took and rinsed his mouth out. He collapsed then crying.
"Vaughn," Sydney was scared, she had never seen him like this before "I'm here"
"Sydney"
He looked up at her and reached his hands out pulling her to him. She ended up on his lap holding onto him for dear life as he shook and cried into her hair.
"Shshshshhh" she cradled his head against herself "You're alright Vaughn. I'm here and I'm not leaving you"
"Syd" he choked "I'm so sorry"
"We've been through this before I think" said Sydney looking at him.
"I know" he said trying to smile "But I just read what she's done. Syd it's…" he stopped and shook his head "I'm married to a monster,….a.. a thing with no conscience"
"Vaughn you didn't know" Sydney said at a loss as to what to tell him to make him feel better.
"I should have waited for you" he looked at her "I'll never-"
Sydney put her fingers on her lips to silence him.
"Don't say it not now" she said
"You know I do right?"
"I know, we'll always find each other, be together"
She stood up pulling him up behind her. She gave him a look and he smiled slightly they walked out of the bathroom together ignoring the looks they got. As Vaughn still looked pale and shaky they dismissed it as it was obvious Sydney was just looking after him.
Jack saw the two of them sit back down at their desks from his office. He got up and called them both into his office.
"You two are going home now" he said "Agent Vaughn you are in no state to be working, go and get a head start on the mission"
They both nodded. They knew what it meant, get the hell out of here before you do something stupid that you'll regret later. They walked out again getting into separate cars and driving in convoluted and completely different ways to the safe house.
TBC
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