The Split
She goes home.
Except it doesn't feel like home, and there is no homecoming, just a lonely ride on the amtrak with her shadow and her troubled thoughts for company. Despite Eyal's warnings, despite her better judgement, here she is. The voice in her head laughs at her, laughs at her for trying to defy the odds yet again, laughs at her for thinking this could be easy. Her secret is another weight she'll have to carry, and she can already feel it weighing her down.
The National Mall is beautiful this time of morning, quiet and breezy. It's early and the crowds aren't there yet, just the occasional passerby. The reflecting pool is still, a perfect reflection of the world around it. A perfect reflection of her. She stands at the edge of the water and studies it. She stares.
She's not sure she recognizes the woman staring back.
"Auggie."
It feels strange, saying his name after everything, after not saying it at all for so long. It feels different, tastes different as it rolls off her tongue. Heavy, bitter sweet - a breathless murmur that screams to say a million other things. He stops and turns to face her like he's done a thousand times before, and she looks at him - really looks at him - for the first time since she left him on the street in Hong Kong all those months ago. She savors the memories of the time before everything changed, before they became so broken, but they feel like a distant dream. He looks older than she remembers. He looks exhausted. Fractured.
This is what's left of the fire she started.
This is what she did to him.
And somehow he still forgives her.
So she pushes him away, because she loves him too much. She tells him she needs space, because she is too afraid.
With every word, another piece of her heart breaks.
With every lie, another piece of the Annie Walker she knew fades out of existence.
The polygraph room feels familiar.
Annie can recall, most instances without fondness, the many times she's spent in a straight back plastic chair like this one. The polygraph whirs, the analyst in the seat across form her glowers and scowls, the two-way glass mirror looms behind him. He asks his questions, she gives him his answers. She tells him everything the CIA will want to hear.
Auggie and Calder aren't buying it.
But before they can try to figure it out, an answered prayer comes in the form of a phone call and the sound of Calder's wingtips walking across the polygraph room's tile floor. She uses the brief few seconds to plea her case to Auggie, because he's the only one she trusts. She's not stupid, and neither is he. He promises to try, her promises to fight for her like he always has, but the look on his face belies the reality they both know is there.
There are no real accolades for breaking the rules when you play the game. Even if you win. Langley would like nothing more than to clip her wings and watch her fall, even after all she's done, even after all she's given up.
Sacrifice is part of the job description.
A threat on American soil, terrorists and old enemies - it's all Langley needs. In the monopoly game of espionage, it's like a get-out-of-jail-for-free. So they fast track her, and turn their heads, and tell her "this isn't over yet, Walker", because right now they need her more than she needs them.
Annie revels in it, the power it gives her.
She also knows it could all be gone in a blink.
They're sending her to Chicago for a reason though, because they believe she's the best there is.
She wants to believe it too, and part of her does, but the other part of her can feel the hole being burned into the bottom of the bag she's carrying, the one holding the auto-injectors containing her nitrate medication.
When steps off of the lear jet and onto the sunny, too bright tarmac of O'hare International, she has to force a smile when she shakes Charlie's hand.
It happens so quickly she doesn't even realize it before it's too late.
What did you expect?
This is what Annie asks herself, collapsed in some God forsaken back alley, gasping for air and feeling like a thousand pounds of crushing force is sitting on her lungs. The world is spinning. She fumbles with the auto injector, her vision blurry from threatening tears and her body rigid, uncooperative. The ultimate paralysis is fear. The knife digs deeper into her chest.
She manages to drive the needle into her thigh, and after several more seconds of agonizing pain, the fog finally lifts as the nitrates take their affect. Her chest relaxes, and her heart stops feeling like it's seizing.
Borz Altan, the man she was following, the man involved with a possible terrorist attack, is nowhere to be seen.
You let him get away.
She closes her eyes, teeth clenched.
Much like she told Eyal in Tel Aviv, being a spy is more than just what she does, it's who she chooses to be. This job is what makes up every fiber of her being, it's what gives her purpose, and yet the cruel reality is that it's also the reason she's suffering. For the first time she asks herself a question she hasn't been able to face until now, unwilling to admit what acknowledging it would mean - surrender to the same inevitability she's spent her entire life outrunning.
How broken are you, Annie? How long until you break permanently?
When she returns to the Chicago facility, she's pulled herself back together. The facade of infallible spy is securely in place. The analysts and other agents stay out of her way as she storms back through the bullpen - she's fire and brimstone and hell-hath-no-fury like a woman in Louboutins. It's intimidation at it's finest.
She dives back into the work, mostly because she's driven by determination, but also because of the gnawing guilt in the pit of her stomach.
Charlie offers her the so called file from McQuaid Securities, Borz former employer, and she skims through the scant manilla folder with mounting irritation. Private Military Companies, despite their heavy involvement in government sanctioned operations, were notorious for their lack of transparency. So it shouldn't come as a surprise that Ryan McQuaid and his company wear the cliche so well, but today Annie has lost her patience with interagency diplomacy.
In that moment she makes a decision that will change everything.
"I need to speak to him."
"Get his liaison on the phone-"
"No. I want to speak to McQuaid himself."
A/N: Thanks for the reviews you guys, I'm really glad you're liking it so far. I promise we'll have plenty of Ryan from here on out, I just had to set the pace. We're getting inside Annie's head, isn't it fun? I like this loose, sort of disjointed style of writing, it can be fun and artistic and deep in it's simplicity. Enjoy! ;) xoxo