She stands on the balcony, finally free of the awful Julia Thorne costume, and looks out over the lights of the city. She can vaguely hear Vaughn and Weiss inside the room, and her father's voice on the conference phone. The air is warm, and she runs her fingers over the spot on her neck—and there is a spot—where Sark bit her. Vaughn hates the idea of him helping them, she knows it, but then, Vaughn always hated Sark anyway. She's never been completely sure of the reason why.
Just then she hears Vaughn's footsteps at the doorway. She turns and he's at the sliding door. "Your dad wants to talk to you," he doesn't look her in the eye.
She brushes past him and goes to where Weiss is seated on the couch, his arms folded across his chest.
"Hi, Dad," she says. "So, what do you think?"
"I don't like it," Jack's voice is tinny over the intercom, "But it's more important that the Covenant not get their hands on the weapon than how it happens. Put the tracking device that Marshall gave you on the decoy cylinder so we can track Sark's movements, and bring the real cylinder home. Are you sure you can do this?"
"Dad, it's fine," she assures him, glancing at Vaughn. "It's nothing I haven't done a thousand times before."
"Be careful, sweetheart, and good luck," Jack hangs up, and the silence in the room is interminable. Weiss looks between them and finally struggles up off the couch, saying, "I'm gonna go check out the hotel bar for awhile."
The door has barely clicked shut behind him when she says, "What is your problem?"
"I don't have a problem," Vaughn shakes his head and finally looks at her. "Why, do you?"
"Vaughn!" she shakes her head, exasperated. "I don't like it either, cooperating with someone like Sark, but if it means finding out what the Cov—"
"Cooperating? Is that what you call this?" He's visible upset as he crosses the room and sits next to her on the couch, brushes her hair back from her neck. "This is more than cooperating."
She cannot meet his eyes, and they sit there side by side for several agonizing minutes.
"Michael," she says at last, and she tries not to think about them in her bed—you know you can call me Michael, right?—"I have to find out where I've been. And if that means letting Sark help us, then so be it. He's motivated by his money to cooperate with us."
"And when he finds out it was you who killed his father?"
Lazarey. She hadn't thought that far in advance.
"You didn't even think of that, did you," Vaughn's voice softens a little. "Syd, I can't be everywhere at once… It's bad enough that I have to actively keep this from Lauren—"
The very mention of the name snaps something inside her, like the first awful crack of the ice on a pond splitting. "And when did I ever ask you to protect me? I can't believe I'm hearing this… I'm going to go take a shower." She stalks away from the couch to the bathroom, turning on the hot water faucet and watching as the steam rising hypnotically from the tub. The extra weight of the long hair is making her scalp sore.
"Syd," Vaughn is at the door of the bathroom. "This isn't any easier for me than it is for you. You know that."
"Do I?" she is taking off her clothes with the door open. She glances at him from behind the curtain of her hair and he's turning away at least. Boy Scout to the last. She reaches over and slams the door, practically on his hand.
She sings, as she steps into the scalding hot water.
I can be cruel, I don't know why
Why won't my bal-la-loon stay up in a perfectly windy sky?1
1. Cruel, Tori Amos.