Chapter Four

Sydney

I end up listening to the silence in the seat across the aisle the entire flight home. In my mind, I was begging him to just forget about us and to tell me about what else I have missed and asking all sorts of questions. But I couldn't get myself to voice any of my thoughts.

Finally, while taxing on the ground to our rendezvous with another CIA van, I find my voice. I don't know why I chose to ask what I did, I suppose it was just on the top of the pile and I knew I might never get a chance to talk to him like this again.

"How did I go missing?"

Vaughn turns to look at me with a mildly curious expression. Then he looks at the floor and is silent for so long, I think that any minute he will turn away and not answer me.

"Do you remember I told you I was going to pick you up after my debrief?" He asks softly, that I almost don't realize he said something. Yes, that is still crystal clear in my mind. For me, that feels like it happened tonight. But all the feelings of excitement over going to Santa Barbara are completely crushed. I nod when he glances up at me.

"Well, I showed up. Right on time. You didn't answer your doorbell, so figured you were way back in your closet still packing, or in the shower or something. I walked in anyway, knowing you wouldn't mind," he swallows, then continues shaking his head a little.

"The place was a wreak. Everything looked broken. I could tell a fight had happened and I tried not to panic, but I knew something was wrong. I called your name and got no answer, so I started walked through. When I spotted Will in the tub, I snapped out of my daze. I called your father and told him what I'd found while I checked Will. I found a slight pulse and called 911. It's all a big blur to remember now, but I know I did make it into your room sometime that night, still looking."

I was reliving the fight all while he was talking. I can still remember shooting that fake and trying to get up and go back to Will. But my body hadn't responded. I had slipped into blackness and awoken to this….nightmare, really. I pay close attention to Vaughn's next words.

"I saw Francie dead, I was horrified then, and I learned about the double later. And that big mirror was shattered and I saw the gun amongst the glass fragment. There was blood all mixed in it, it later tested to be yours. But you," he has to pause and take a breath.

"You weren't there. It was like you had evaporated. We searched for a long time but everything was a dead end. After about a year…you file was changed from missing to presumed dead."

He is quiet and I look out my window. There is nothing I can say to that. The plane stops and the guards come to cart me away. Vaughn and I exchange a good-bye look. I have no idea what he is thinking.

I am escorted off the plane, into the waiting van, and driven to face the rest of my new but familiar world. I can't help but wonder if Vaughn being married is one of the least or one of the greatest surprises I will have to learn to live with.

Agent Alice

It has been three hours since I got home and I am very….anxious. I know I told Michael I would be home around 8:30 tonight. But it's pushing midnight now and there is no sign of him. Where in the world could he be? This is very unlike him. If he'd been called by the CIA, he would have left a note saying he'd had to run to his "job" at the State Department. Yet the counter is empty.

At first, I was willing to believe it was just a rare late night at his office, so I unpacked and settled in to watch a movie while I waited. When he wasn't back by 11, I gave up.

Now I am standing in the kitchen in my pajamas, staring at the microwave clock. It blinks 11: 52 and finally 11:53. I don't think he will be back tonight. Now I am faced with a new dilemma. Is this something that will have a rational explanation or will I need to report this to Sloane? I will probably include it in my report anyway, better safe than sorry. Still, if this turns out to be some innocent night with Eric that he forgot to tell me about, I hate how it will look to Sloane after I raise an alarm.

Well, Michael or no Michael, I desperately need my sleep. And to think I wasted all this time being worried. Obviously, the months of just living with him have softened me even more. But I am resolved that will not matter when it comes down to the final line.

Vaughn

The garage door rattles up and Vaughn pulls into his space when it is well into the day. His wife's car is there, and his hearts sinks a little. He was hoping she'd be out. It was a futile hope born from cowardice, he knew she never had to work the day after a "conference," but he is so tired from having his life turned upside down yet again. He does not want to have to face Alice yet.

Trying to appear as if everything is normal, Vaughn makes himself walk briskly into the house and smile when he sees Alice walking across the living room towards him. Her short blond hair is rumpled and she's still in her pajamas. She purposefully strides right over to give him a hug and a kiss.

He accepts it, what else can he do? But he isn't going to wait for her to grill him, so he plunges in.

"I'm sorry I wasn't here when you got home."

Alice steps back and eyes him curiously.

"I'm just glad you're alright. I tried to call you. What happened?"

He already knows that. Vaughn tries for a mixture of the truth and a small stretch. Eric will cover for him, he knows that too.

"Yeah, I saw my missed calls on my way home. I got called into State last night, and I thought it was gunna be quick and that I'd be right back but…it wasn't," he sighs.

"I just decided to sleep at Eric's since he was closer and I was really tired."

Alice gave him another once over with her eyes before leaning up to give him another kiss along with her forgiveness.

"Okay, I'm glad I know now. Just..you have a right to call your wife if stuff comes up," she tried to tease him. He wasn't in the mood to play along, so he just gave her as best a "point taken" smile as he could and headed straight for a shower.

Alice

I start to get breakfast ready while he is in the shower and take the time to think about what's happened. While Michael looked just fine when he walked in, he seems to be distracted with something. The only thing I can think of is that something big happened at the CIA. So I am inclined to believe his explanation, but there has to be more to it as well. What was so important that they couldn't tell him the truth when they brought him in?

I can't come up with anything right now, but instinct tells me that changes are ahead and I better keep a closer eye on him.

The pipes stop their faint noises as he turns the shower of and I hear him bumbling around in the bedroom. A half-smile comes to my face before I can stop it as I remember when we were shopping for our furniture and he was insisting that we each have our own chest of drawers. I wouldn't have minded sharing a dresser, but when I suggested it, he flat out wouldn't hear of it. I found it quite amusing at the time, but gave in easily.

I curiously look towards the door, he hasn't come out. So I go over to tell him breakfast is ready, and have to stop in the middle of starting to speak as I see him sprawled over his side of the bed. Already asleep. Eric's sofa must not have been very restful, if he was even there at all.

With a small sigh, I turn back to go eat alone.

I mentally compose my next message to Sloane while I am cleaning up, and I'm on the way to my own shower, when I hear Michael muttering in his sleep. Thinking nothing at first, I freeze when I recognize what he's saying.

"Syd…no….. Syd don't be gone…"

I can hear the blood rushing in my head. He hasn't had a dream about her for while. I shouldn't even bother being concerned. She's dead and he's a means to an end. But compounded with my personal feelings, is the realization that this is happening at the same time as something at the CIA…

I focus all too clearly on the implications of that thought. What if Sydney Bristow is not dead after all?

After the plane ride and arrival at the strip in LA, I was handcuffed again, carted in a white van again, sent through all sorts of tracking device detectors, metal detectors, electronic scanners, and radiation detectors. They took a blood sample and a urine sample. I swear, I am going to let Kendal have it when I see him.

Then they brought me here, this is the thing that really infuriates me, to be held in my mother's old cell. Just brought me and dumped me and I haven't seen another human for an hour or so.

The camera's are blinking their little green and red lights at me. I wonder who is watching me from the other side. I can't believe they would put me in the same cell as that woman. Is it a sign of what they now think I am?

There are so many questions I want answered. How has the search for Sloane gone? Is he dead or alive? Vaughn said Will was ok, but how? What has happened to him these past years? Where was I? Oh god! What if they've seen me do things that I don't remember doing!

That must be it. I must have been taken by Sloane, brainwashed, and forced to work for him, and flaunted to the CIA. Therefore, the CIA must think I've turned. The fact that scares me is I don't know if that's true or not! I must have been doing some sort of fighting. Besides a new scar on my stomach, since being in this cell, I've found one on my right shoulder and one on my left hip. Both small but recent.

I wish I could talk to my dad! He'd listen to me...unless he thinks I'm following in my mother's footsteps. Where is he? What has he been up to? And Dixon? and Marshall? Marshall had a crush on Carrie last I knew. What has happened there? and Weiss! Did he encourage Vaughn to go on and forget me when they couldn't find a trace? I guess I should say IF they couldn't find a trace. Did Vaughn's love for me die while he watched me do horrible things that I can't remember?

No longer crying for just the loss of Vaughn, I am crying for the loss of two years of my life. Two years that I should have been fighting for good, instead I might have been fighting for evil.

Sydney

In the main room of the Joint Task Force a grizzled old man stood stiffly watching surveillance videos. The young woman sitting alone in the cell had started sobbing and it broke his heart he could do nothing about it.

As Jack watched his daughter just as many questions flowed through his head as had been flowing through hers. The truth was there had been so sign of her for the one year and nine months he had been searching. And out of the blue she called and asked to come in. Kendall was right to be cautious but forbidding any contact with Sydney unless authorized by him was a bit to much.

He wondered what had happened in those years to make her cry so hard upon her return. Well, since when was he one to follow the rules! Jack turned and walked crisply down the hall to the access gates.

As he walked, his mind still churned. Mostly with frustration for Kendall. Did Kendall really think Jack had grown soft while Sydney was gone? Did he really think Jack would break down upon the arrival of his long-lost daughter? Jack was sure of it. Every word that man spoke alluded to an incompetence on Jack's part.

But Jack knew better. If he had been growing soft it had been when his daughter had been around. The time without Sydney had forced him to reevaluate his life strongly. He had become even more closed off and reclusive. No one got around Jack Bristow's defenses. Even Barnett had given up on him. He had lived with one purpose only. To make Sloane and Irina pay.

Now, the one person who ever had gotten around the wall's he'd built after Laura "died", was sitting in her mother's cell, looking more broken than ever before. And he was so confused, not willing to give in quite yet to the heartstrings the sight of his daughter pulled.

Jack put his card key in the access slot and let the computer take his fingerprint. The gates started to rumble up and to the side as he was cleared and he walked down the hall.

She looked so broken, so defeated. He stood quietly in front of the window, waiting for her to notice him. She was stretched out on the cot, her arms folded around her body and her legs curled up together. She made no move to cover her face or wipe away the tears streaming from her closed eyes. It was awhile but Jack finally saw her chest stop heaving, her arms relax. She blinked, then opened her eyes wide as she saw him standing there.

"Dad!" She cried out, her voice sounding strangled.

Jack wondered at the mix of relief, reserve, love, and anger that was evident in her eyes.