Chapter 16
Chapter 16
The Following Takes Place Between 9:00 P.M. and 10:00 P.M.
Jack looked around the CTU conference room and was half expecting it to be standing room only. Sydney and Nadia were at the far end of the room—away from him and close to the door, which didn't exactly bode well for his relationship. Michael stood next to Sydney as a matter of course, even though the two of them didn't work at the same location anymore. Tony and Dixon were on either side of Jack had he the time, he would have thought that this was a bad start to the planning session.
"Assuming Irina is telling the truth, we still need to grab Sark," Jack began. "Holding onto him is...frustrating."
"Irina was planning to meet with him in thirty minutes," Sydney said thoughtfully, "I say that we make sure that she keeps that appointment."
"Considering that your mother is currently undergoing major surgery, that's going to be a little hard to pull off, isn't it?" Dixon asked.
Sydney didn't answer, she just looked at her husband.
"You're thinking about when we had him in the holding cell three years ago, aren't you?" Vaughn asked rhetorically.
"Sark's already demonstrated that he's willing to blind himself to what should have been an obvious deception," Sydney reminded him. "And we have the means and the magic to pull it off again."
Jack watched the two of them talk, until he finally had to ask, "Would someone mind telling me what you're talking about?"
"Three years ago, my ex-wife Lauren Reed—a double agent Nina Myers could have taken lessons from—impersonated Sydney in order to obtain information regarding a Rimbaldi document, and to frame Sydney for another of her acts of treason," Vaughn tried to sound neutral, those who had been around him at the time had a pretty good idea of how big a number Lauren had done on his head. "She used a modified flesh mask and voice box to clear security. "
"She was scheduled to rendezvous with Sark a few hours later, but we managed to get Sark in custody before than," Sydney continued. "After conventional methods of interrogation failed, I used similar technology to impersonate Lauren, and to pretend that we had managed to apprehend her. It took us less than five minutes to get what we needed out of him."
Tony merely arched a brow, then shifted in his chair. "I take it this is a roundabout way of telling us that you have similar material for your mother either here or at APO," Tony reasoned out.
"I helped design it myself," Marshall's voice said from the speaker phone, in a tone that lacked his usual panache. "There was a situation about a year and a half when I thought we might need to use a version of it for, ah, Sydney's father-- we were trying to save him from radiation poisoning, long story, happy ending-- but it turned out, it was never really necessary to use it." He paused. "Until now."
"You could have it prepped and ready in less than ten minutes," Jack asked.
"I can be out the door with it in five," Marshall said with some vigor.
"No," Mr. Bristow said. "We need you to finish deciphering the Rimbaldi material we got of the disk, particularly who that genetic file belongs to. How long will it take to get out there?"
Sydney glanced at her watch. "If we leave now, less than fifteen minutes. We'd be cutting it close, but given the circumstances, I'm thinking Sark will be willing to wait."
"How much backup are you going to bring?" Jack asked.
Sydney had already given this some thought. "One team, heavily armed, with you and Vaughn to run point. I don't think we'll need the firepower-- Sark has demonstrated that he's willing to roll over on anyone if it keeps him alive-- but I don't think that he'll be alone. We need to be ready for anything."
Nadia looked at her sister, eyes narrowed. "Is there a reason you are not asking me to this party?"
Jack leaned forward, looking at his fiancée with a glance that was either pure rage, or intense concern. "Because you should still be in a hospital bed. Tou came out of surgery less than two hours ago."
Nadia looked at her sister.
"This time I happen to agree with him," Sydney said almost apologetically. "Normally, I'd be asking you to be the one wearing the mask—you resemble Irina a lot better than I do—but you just took a knife to the chest. If Sark does suspect something, there's a much better chance that he could take you than he could me, even with the team."
"Besides, right now, we still need you to help translate what's in that data file," Dixon added.
Nadia glanced around, seeing that everyone was against her. She wasn't going to be heading anywhere that these five didn't want her to, unless she was willing to fight her way to it, and not even she could possibly get away with that.
For a tense moment, everyone wondered if Nadia was going to argue. Instead she managed a sickly looking smile. "Who am I to protest the will of the majority?' she mumbled. "After all, you clearly knew what you were doing when you decided to handle my mother."
"Nadia--" Jack began.
"You don't have time to apologize, and I am not yet ready to accept it," Nadia told him. "Just get Sark, and figure out who the fuck is manipulating all of us. I'm getting goddamn tired of feeling like a marionette."
Before anyone else could speak, Nadia had left the room, heading back to the station Michelle had set up for her a little more than an hour ago.
"Is she going to be all right?" Tony asked.
"Does it matter?" Sydney countered with a bit more cruelty in her voice then she had intended. "Time is getting very fucking short, and we can't waste it hand-holding."
"Sydney's right," Jack said, pushing the situation out of his mind. "We need to be prepped and out the door in less than five minutes if we're going to pull this off."
"You still haven't told us how we're going to handle Irina if and when she comes out of surgery," Dixon asked as the others headed out.
"Armed guards around the surgical units at all time," Jack said. "Doctors say it'll probably be at least an hour and a half before they'll be finished. The second that she can be revived, we're doing it. I don't believe for a moment she's told us everything that she knows, and we need to find out what that is before we ship her ass anywhere."
"And Nadia?'
Jack didn't hesitate. "Don't let her anywhere near her mother," he said coolly "This woman has the ability to plague us even when she's dying; I'm not having her play any more games."
9:09:31/9:09:32/9:09:33
Vaughn had been waiting for some kind of explosion from his wife ever since he had told her that she was being ordered from seeing her mother, but Sydney had been eerily quiet since then. Now as they began to arm themselves, Sydney finally spoke directly to him.
"How big was your part in getting this executive order created?" she asked in a dull tone
"It was primarily Jack's idea," Vaughn grudgingly admitted, "but when he came forward with it, I didn't shy away from supporting it."
"And you didn't think that I'd have any objections?" Sydney asked., sounding a little angrier.
Vaughn put down the assault rifle he was holding and turned towards her. "How many times has she tried to kill you? Or your father? Fuck, an hour ago she was willing to murder our daughter! I know she's your mother, and that she's always going to have this hold on you, but how many more people have to die before you accept what she is?"
"You're not exactly unprejudiced, Michael."
Vaughn's eyes widened. "You're going to lecture me on having a bias towards an enemy agent? She murdered my father...as part of a killing spree eliminating dozens of other agents. Given all the nightmares, she and her family have put us through--" He stopped. "Do you know how hard it was for me to have the person who murdered someone you care about more than anything at my mercy at last, and not being able to pull the trigger?"
And because Sydney had been in this position more times than she could count, she relented a little. "I don't know why I'm not more angry at her," she told Vaughn slowly "She's put us through so many hurdles, done so much violence. Christ, if you'd asked me just an hour ago, I would've been willing to tear her limb from limb." She stopped checking her Glock for a moment. "I just want to get away from all this."
"Go off to that island together?" Vaughn asked, referring to an old dream he raised with Sydney more than once after they'd gotten married. "I'd like that, too. Thing is, I don't think that's in either one of us."
"What do you mean?"
"I think we're both more like Jack Bauer than either of us want to admit," Vaughn said. "We can say that all we want is a normal life, but there's something in our blood that keeps us this in the middle of this game, no matter what the cost "
Sydney looked at Jack, who was coming towards him. "I'm not sure that he'd say that it was worth it," she reminded Vaughn. "In fact, right now I think he'd say that the price is too high."
"Helicopter's ready," Jack told them. "Rest of our teams prepped."
"Then let's go," Sydney said.
As they walked off, Vaughn looked at Sydney. "We okay?" he asked, sounding a bit more forlorn than he wanted, too.
"Not now," Sydney told him before taking his hand, "but I think we will be."
9:14:55/9:14:56/9:14:57/9:14:58
Nadia didn't know whether Dixon had been honest about her being able to help translate the Rimbaldi data or whether it was more busy work to keep her from forcing her way onto the mission to grab Sark. Either way, it wasn't seeming to make much difference because she was having a lot of difficulty concentrating on the letters and symbols that were in front of her.
"You getting anywhere?" Nadia looked up to see Michelle walking towards her.
"Where the hell have you been?" Nadia asked, only partly in jest.
"Supervising domestic response," Michelle told her, sliding onto the top of Nadia's desk, making herself comfortable. " Since the news of the Premier's death, there have been a lot of report of white-on-Asian violence, particularly in Chinatown, but even in Little Tokyo."
"I guess to bigots all people with yellow skin bleed the same," Nadia said bitterly.
"We've also heard a lot of chatter from white supremacist groups throughout the state of California who are using this as this as an excuse to bring out the whole laundry list about how everything this President has ever done before and after the last twelve hours is a clear sign for armed insurrection."
Nadia rolled her eyes. "This just the usual bullshit chatter, or is there anything real behind it?"
"We're not sure," Michelle admitted. "And right now our resources are being stretched to the point that we won't be able to police California more much longer." She lowered her voice. "There is some talk in the government that President may have to order a state of martial law very soon, not just here, but across the country."
Nadia wasn't thinking about her mother any more. "If Sydney and Jack do bring back Sark in their mission, will this do anything to put the pin back in the grenade?" she asked.
"Honestly, I don't know." Suddenly Michelle sounded very tired. "It might get the Chinese off our backs, but there have been race incidents of escalating magnitude all across the country over the past eight hours. What we saw earlier today in Inglewood could be repeated tenfold across the nation."
"Christ," Nadia said solemnly
Michelle paused. "I guess you can understand why a lot of people at Division are kind of pissed when Tony devoted agency resources to translating some document that's over five hundred years old," she said. "As much as I hate to admit it, I kind of see their point."
"Put that way," Nadia admitted, "I'd have a lot of trouble justifying it, too."
"Then why are people-- why are you-- doing it?"
"Because I've had too much experience to disregard Rimbaldi. If he has anything to do with what's going on today, there's something a lot bigger involved."
"I admit, exterminating more than 99 percent of the population seems like a big thing," Michelle told her, "but we've been facing this kind of option all day, and it hasn't changed any part of our game plan. Beside, from what Sydney has told me about Rimbaldi, apocalyptic prophecies are nothing new."
"I don't think it's a matter of what's involved, I think it has to do with who," Nadia said. thoughtfully "There have only been a select number of the people who know about Rimbaldi and his works. Until today I wouldn't have believed that a relatively low level terrorist leader like Wang would have been one of those people. Now Jack tells us he knew something about it. Which means that there may have been more behind today's attacks than just sectional and racial destruction."
"What could possibly be any bigger than what's going on now?" Michelle asked disbelievingly.
"More things than heaven and earth, Michelle," Nadia said. "And there aren't a lot of people in this business who believe in that, either." She focused her attention on that.. "Which is why I really thinking we need to know who Sark is working for."
9:21:16/9:21:17/9:21:18
Located to the north of Bel Air and Beverly Hills, Stone Canyon Reservoir wasn't exactly in the middle of nowhere. While this would make it easier to find a place to set up out of sight, it made it a lot more difficult to find a place to land the CTU helicopter. They finally touched down on a relatively isolated stretch of highway about a mile from the location
"How exactly are we going to play this?" Jack yelled over the rotors.
"I'm going in alone," Sydney told them. "We don't know how much firepower Sark is bringing with him, but I think it's pretty safe to assume he'll have somebody doing some kind of surveillance. First sign of trouble he'll run, no matter how much he needs to meet with my mother."
Knowing what they did about Sark's character, neither Jack or Vaughn was inclined to disagree. "Then when do you want us to grab him?" Vaughn asked.
"First I want to find out as much as I can about what he and Irina are here for," Sydney said.
"But we don't know all that Irina knows," Jack reminded her. "And we already know it doesn't take much to get his wind up."
"We know that it has something to do with Isabelle," Vaughn countered. "And that somehow her--" he stumbled over the next word, "sacrifice might bring about the end times."
"You're not telling me that Sark actually buys into this Armageddon bullshit?" Jack asked.
"He believed in it enough to follow Sloane for years." Everybody looked around to see that Sydney's father had arrived. "In all likelihood, you're right. He's probably been told that this was to be solely for immortality, or something for his own benefit. Obviously, he's invested enough resources into it today to seem like he's bought into it now."
"You have what we need?" Sydney asked.
Jack Bristow produced a small black briefcase. "Marshall was able to translate a little more of the data file."
"Did he find anything to verify what Irina told us?" Jack asked.
"He's found repeated references of the Italian word for 'decimation'" Mr. Bristow told them as he opened the case and began to take out the material. "Supposedly one part of the document reads, 'only through an ocean of blood will the new race begin to walk."
"That sounds more like it's out of Exodus than anything Milo Rimbaldi ever came up with," Sydney said as she reached for the mask that she would need.
"There a set of guideline as to what kind of reference a prophet can use for his writings?" Vaughn asked ironically. "I'm more impressed that it sounds like what Irina was talking about in her interrogation."
"We're really talking about this," Jack said disbelievingly. "All of this bloodshed and high treason is just so that a handful of people can gain immortality?"
"You have a better explanation as to why Wang and Sark and whoever else have orchestrated all this?" Mr. Bristow countered.. "Because bringing about the apocalypse doesn't fit either of their MOs."
And because Jack Bauer was having a hard time coming with a suitable explanation for the massive carnage those two had wrought, he turned his attention back to the matter at hand. "Assuming that Irina believes all this, how much of this do you think that you'll need to convince Sark that you're her?" he asked
Vaughn took something from his pocket and handed it to Sydney. "This is Irina's cell. I took it off her when I took her into custody. Knowing Sark, any minute now he's going to call and give some kind of instructions But we know the way he thinks. If Irina tells him to make some kind of alteration in their plan, he'll do it."
."I take it you have one in mind?"
At that moment the call began to ring. "You ready?" Vaughn asked Sydney.
Sydney took the phone. "Yes?" she said in a voice that was eerily close to Irina's.
"Do you have what we need?" Sark said.
"That's a pretty blasé way to refer to my granddaughter," Sydney said as Irina.
"You didn't seem to mind that when we discussed it before."
"You didn't go through what I did in order to get her," Sydney countered in a voice that was just off enough that it might arouse suspicion.
"Now is hardly the best time to have doubts, Irina," Sark said in that frustratingly calm voice Sydney had come to loathe.
"Where do you want to meet?"
"The overpass near the top of the dam," Sark said. "Five minutes."
Sydney knew that they might have vulnerabilities to set up there. "How do I know you won't kill me the second I'm standing over the reservoir?" she asked.
There was a pause. "So you've decoded the gene cluster," Sark said.
"I know enough to know that somebody's going to have to die. I'm just trying to make sure that you don't do it until I get what I'm owed.."
Another pause, this one long enough to make Sydney wonder if she'd pushed too hard. "How would you like me to demonstrate my sincerity?" Sark finally asked.
"We meet at the bridge in front of the reservoir," Irina said. "And you call off whatever snipers you've got guarding you."
"All right. But now you only have four minutes to get there." With that Sark terminated the call.
"Get the team into position," Sydney instructed in her normal voice. Jack had almost forgotten how good a mimic she was.
"You really intend to string Sark along?" Vaughn asked. "As soon as we apply the right pressure on him, he'll sing."
"That Sark didn't have immortality being dangled in front of him," Sydney said, as she straightened the mask on her face. "Besides, you always get more information from him voluntarily than with any kind of force."
"Don't fuck around," Jack told her. "You find yourself in trouble, give the signal."
"The hell he's put us through all these years and you think he's going to give me trouble?' Sydney shook her head.
"I do. Just remember, like Irina we need him alive. Not unhurt."
9:31:45/9:31:46/9:31:47/9:31:48
Sydney knew that despite what Sark had just told 'Irina', and even if he wasn't the top man on the totem pole, he would probably have at least a few mercenaries gathered around him, and at least one sniper around the perimeter of the reservoir. She had arrived at the rendezvous point on the bridge, when she detected movement around the edges.
She knew that Jack and her father would be positioning their team beyond the immediate radius. She hoped that Sark didn't have some kind of security capable of locating them, but then if Sark really had access to that kind of tech, they had been screwed before they arrived.
A silver Mercedes pulled up to the bridge. Two men armed with automatic weapons emerged from the back seats. Julian Sark emerged from the front. "Lovely night, wouldn't you say, Irina?"
"I told you to call off your dogs," 'Irina' angrily told him..
"So we're not even going to preserve the niceties?" Sark nodded to his men, each of whom took a position book-ending their master.
"We passed that point a long time ago, luv," Sydney slurred the last line deliberately.
"Given the way you've handled your partners and the family in the past, I would be a fool not to come unprotected," her nemesis said in that faux bonhomie Sydney had come to loathe. "If I could fit a tank in here, I'd be in it."
Sydney moved closer. "I only react violently when I feel I've been betrayed.," she told him.
"That's an interesting way to put things, considering that you don't seem to have the item we agreed upon."
"I'll remind you once again not to refer to Isabelle that way, at least while she's still alive." It took more than Sydney thought to deliver that last sentence in a level tone.
"How do I know you even have her?"
Sydney had prepared for this, and removed a small ribbon that she had taken from her daughter's hair. "I didn't get this at Toys R Us" she told him. "You don't get her until you tell me who the 'sacrifice' is."
Sark raised an eyebrow. "You don't know yet?"
"You know how complicated the human genome is," Sydney argued.. "Even with my knowledge of Rimbaldi, it could still take days to get the data translated. You would have me go to all this trouble if you didn't have a pretty good idea whose blood was going to have to be spilled. Now is it Isabelle?"
For a moment, Sydney wondered if she'd gone too far with that last sentence. Then Sark spoke. "Your granddaughter isn't big enough to have enough blood to spill," he told her. "There's another passage on the data file that you haven't translated yet. In order for the final solution to be realized, three generations of the Chosen One's bloodline must be intermixed in a great ocean "
"This immorality is worth a great deal if I'm to be killed for it," Sydney reminded him coldly.
"That would only be a problem if we needed to take all of it," Sark told her. "We only need to bleed all of you for a minute at the proper time in the right place. You'll be light-headed, but the immortality will make up for that quickly enough."
"And how exactly did you plan to bring my daughter?" Sydney said putting one hand behind her back. "You know how strong-willed she can be."
"We've got her daughter now," Sark said almost blandly. "You wouldn't know this, but having your child's life threatened can be a very powerful motivator."
Sydney badly wanted to beat the cruel tone out of Sark for that last line a lone. Instead, she spread out two of her fingers in a v-shape. "And I suppose that's your next phone call?" she said as calmly as she could manage.
"Actually, I thought I'd leave that particular task to you," Sark said, walking back towards the car, taking out his phone. "I've got a more important call to make."
A split second before Sark reached his car, rifle file broke out. Before the two men who were guarding Sark could fully react, they were taken out by sniper fire. Sark dove out of sight
Sydney dropped into a crouch, pulled her P7 from her belt, activated her earpiece and rolled around, trying desperately to locate her nemesis.
"Sark's body men are down," she said slowly. "Do you have a twenty on him?"
"Last I saw him, he was on the far side of the vehicle," Jack told her.
Sydney was about ten feet away from the car when Jack yelled: "Syd, hit the deck!"
Her nose had just begun to smell gasoline moments before she hit the ground. Two seconds later the Mercedes exploded.
"Fuck!" Sydney yelled.. "Whoever's in position, Sark is headed back up to the eastern side of the reservoir!"
Just then, a sniper from somewhere in the darkness began taking shots at her, and with the car destroyed, there was no real cover. If APO didn't react fast, this guy was going to fill her with lead.
Without thinking, she yanked her mask off her face, and threw it toward the north, where the shots were coming from. The sniper only wasted three seconds firing at it, but that was long enough for Sydney to reach the far end of the reservoir.
In the meantime, Sark had made it back to the overpass, where he had instructed one of his men to be waiting with another getaway car just in case. What he didn't know was that APO had managed to cover that area, and just as the car reached there, two shots rang out, shattering the driver-side windshield
On the verge of changing direction for the third time in less than three minutes, Sark had gone less than four feet when a small wire came shooting out of the night, and hit him in the back of the neck.. Had he been a little closer to the edge, he might gone into the water, but Vaughn had positioned himself just right, and grabbed the frequent flier before he could collapse.
"You're not getting out of this that easy," Vaughn said as reeled the stun gun back in.
He knew that it would probably be a lot better for the world if he just gave a small push, and let the water swallow Sark. But that would have been too clean a death for someone who had caused as much trouble as him, and Vaughn knew better.
Instead, he went to his earpiece. "All units, converge on my last known coordinates. I have Sark!"
"Alive?"
"He'll have a slight headache when he wakes up," Vaughn said. "After which we'll give him a much bigger one."
9:43:26/9:43:27/9:43:28/9:43:29
After all he had put them through, Jack wished he could have done more than chaining his hands and feet in front of him, and stripping him naked before the festivities could begin. But he knew that time was of the essence, so he decided to hold off further indignities until they could were ready to proceed.
"You have any idea who he was calling?" he asked Sydney, who was online with Marshall going over his ell.
"He's got a scrambler on it," Sydney told him. "I'm uploading the data now, but it's still going to take a few minutes. Have we tracked down all of his henchmen?"
"Your father is in the middle of doing the final sweep, but right now its looking like they're all dead," Vaughn told him. "At least, the ones that he brought with him are. God knows how many he's got in reserve waiting in case something went wrong."
"Why fuck around?" Jack told him. "I say we ask him."
With that, he slapped Sark hard across the face. Slowly their tormentor began to stir. "Wake up, you piece of shit."
Sark began to rouse. If he was at all put out by his position or the people who were surrounding him, he gave no sign. "Mr. Bauer," he managed to see. "It seems you have the advantage of me."
"Always the master of the understatement," Jack muttered.
Sark twisted his head to the left. "So what exactly is your plan? Beat on me until I talk?"
"Actually, I was figuring we'd just whale on you for the hell of it," Sydney told him, as she got up.
"I must compliment you, Sydney," Sark said in those beguiling tones strangers might have found charming. "Fooling me twice with the same trick. That takes real skill on your part."
"You never were the brightest star in the heavens," Sydney then reached out and grabbed Sark's testicles.
"Here's the only deal we're offering, and it's non-negotiable," she said in a low voice. "You're going to tell where the remaining vials are, who you're working for, and what the fuck my DNA has to do with Milo Rimbaldi. In exchange, I might allow you to keep your manhood. This offer will expire in the next sixty seconds. Unfortunately, if you don't help us, you will not expire until much later."
It was difficult to tell in the night sky, but Sydney was pretty sure that Sark paled considerably. "First of all, I must compliment you on your methods of interrogation. You've certainly taken a page out of Jack's handbook here."
Sydney responded by twisting her hand fifteen degrees to the left. "Not helping yourself," she reminded their prisoner.
"I don't suppose it would make any difference to tell you that the man I'm working for has penalties where the term 'fate worse than death' has real meaning?" Sark was maintaining his usual calm, but she could detect a little hysteria behind his usual composure.
"You have fifteen seconds left," Jack told him. "I guess we have to sweeten the deal." He removed a halo knife from one of the compartments in his belt.
"I've never understood your families genetic connection to Rimbaldi," Sark said instantly. "All I know is that it has some vague connection your DNA and the Y chromosome. The actual biology has always been a bit over my head."
"So you're an idiot," Vaughn said calmly. "What else is new?"
"How many vials of the virus are left?" Jack was lowering his knife below Sark's stomach.
"Nine of them are in transport to specific locations across the world," Sark finally told them frantically. "One was in the car that I destroyed. The remaining one is in the glove compartment of the other vehicle I was trying to escape in!"
Jack took the knife away, and headed out to check that car.
"Where are the locations?' Vaughn pressed.
"Laptop in my car, will give you their precise longitude and latitude, along with the estimated time of arrival," Sark told them.
"What alteration did you have Wang make to the virus?" Sydney demanded.
"Ten of them were altered to match genetic marks of the ten most populous races on Earth. Nine are headed to location where they can affect the greatest casualties, I was to disperse the tenth in the Pacific at a given time."
"And the last vial?" Sydney demanded.
"An insurance policy." Sark told them. "Against my collaborator."
"Which brings us to the crucial question-- and an incorrect answer will cost you all your points and at least one testicle-- whose the man behind the curtain?"
Amazingly, Sark seemed to recover some of his bravado. "Why are you asking questions that you already know the answer to?" he asked.
A chill that had nothing to do with the night air began to seep through Sydney's bones. "That's not possible," she said flatly.
"All the things you've seen of Rimbaldi for all this time, and you still refuse to believe?" Sark actually had the nerve to give one of his smug smiles. "Your mother and your aunts believed. Why don't you?"
Jack had returned with the vial in his hand. "What was this vial's destination?"
Sydney now twisted her hand another ten degrees. "Why don't you tell Jack what you're trying to tell us?" she said as Sark moaned.
"The man behind today's attack-- the man who wants all this to succeed-- is Arvin Sloane."
Jack's reaction to this was to put the vial in his pocket, take out his knife, and put it directly below Sark's Adam's apple. "We warned you what the penalties would be for fucking with us," he whispered.
"It's the truth, Jack," Sark was sounding a little too smug for anyone's liking.
"Sloane is dead. I know because I killed him."
"You killed Victor Drazen, too," Sark reminded him. "Jack Bristow murdered Irina Derevko. Sydney thought she'd murdered Allison Dorian-- twice. Everyone thought Sydney was dead for two years. You think I'm lying to you, that's your prerogative. But do you really think you can take the chance I'm not?"
"You're a lying sack of shit, Sark," Vaughn reminding him.
"Really? In five minutes, you'll know I'm telling the truth."
A sickening feeling was filling Jack's stomach. "What are you saying?"
"He's going to be calling to make sure my meeting came off successfully. So unless you want to this happen, I would stop fiddling with my phone and un-cuff me." Sark smiled. "You know how easily Sloane can smell a trap."
9:55:02/9:55:03/9:55:04/9:55:05
Sydney's father had not found anymore mercenaries within the radius of the reservoir. There could very will be more a couple of miles beyond, but right now they didn't have any time to do any further sweeps.
When Jack told him what Sark had related to all of them, Mr. Bristow's reaction was one of resignation.
"You don't really believe him, do you?"
"You remember what we found when we were trying to track down Elena, don't you?" Sydney's father reminded them. "That was as close to a clone as a non-genetic that I've ever seen. It might have taken a lot of effort to create more than one, but if anybody had the patience to do it, it's Arvin Sloane."
Jack just shook his head. "How many times do I have to kill this motherfucker before he fucking dies?!" he said in a whisper.
"As bad as the news is, there are currently more serious things to consider," Mr. Bristow pointed out. "Where are we on the locations of the vials?"
"I found that laptop Sark told us about," Sydney said into the phone. "He was on the level about this much; I have nine sets of coordinates across the globe where the virus is going to be deployed, ranging from the LA-Mexico border to the tropics of Indonesia."
"Fortunately, for seven of the nine locations, we have the luxury of time," Vaughn told them. "Sark claims he's been spending the last two hours sending them out from LA, but based on the coordinates, it's going to take the majority of them eight or nine hours to reach their destinations. I'll contact Director Chase, see what we can do about deploying a nearby agents so that we can stop them."
"What about the other two?"
"One of them is headed to Alaska, which will make transport slightly difficult," Jack responded. "The one near Mexico -- they probably handled it long ago. I'm going to call Tony tell him to contact CDC and other emergency relief agencies and have them prepare for what might be epidemic."
"Don't lose hope yet," Sark spoke up.
"Did anyone say you could talk?" Sydney responded.
"My employee is under orders not to leave his package until he receives word of the sacrifice. You may be able to stop this horror yet."
"Now is not the time for you to be smug," Jack ordered.
"Considering that I'm the one standing between you and international genocide, I think a little conceit on my part is in order."
Jack was about to slap Sark across the face, when his cell began to ring.
"You should probably answer that," Sark replied. "Otherwise, he'll get suspicious."
Not really believing what he was going to consider doing, Jack took the phone out. "Get cute, and--"
"You'll take away my Junior Achievement card, yes, I know."
The button was pressed. "Yes?" Sark asked calmly.
"Have you met with Irina?"
"Yes," Sark replied.
"Do you have what we need?"
Sark hesitated. "I have access to two of the parts of the formula. I still don't know how you intend to get the last without complications."
"Dangle someone she loves in front of Sydney, and she loses perspective. You and I know that better than anyone."
"It wouldn't be simpler to use Nadia?" Sark asked.
There was a pause. "You mention my daughter again, and you won't live long enough to earn your immortality."
The rare anger in the cadence was enough to make Sydney's stomach roll. She would know that part of her ex-boss' voice anywhere.
"The place we agreed upon, thirty minutes," Sloane told them. "And Julian, you've made some major screw-ups today. This is your last chance." With that he hung up.
Sark looked at their stunned faces with reproach. "I believe the next move is yours."
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