AN: This is an intense chapter full of deep FEELS! Music for this chapter (on repeat): Da Svidanya 'Red Army Choir' from The Hunt for the Red October Soundtrack , An Angel Falls by Gabriel Yared, Adagio for Strings by Samuel Barber
SEVEN
o
It had been four days since Irina had made her appearance, and four days of decoding into the early hours of the morning. They had found papers containing the Project Christmas information she had taken from Jack and dates and times of her meetings with her handler, his reports.
Project Christmas seemed to be the only information she ever took from Jack.
Her records from the KGB Academy noted she scored highly in relatively all areas of performance tests and was put on the fast track to a field assignment. It also noted projects she'd worked on before leaving Russia, most notably some sort of code and special language for agents to use in the field.
'No wonder she's such a genius when it comes to decoding.' Sydney thought back to all the times her mother had proven her skills to her while in their custody. 'Of course, she had probably already solved them before turning herself in, being as how she planned the whole thing, their was never any real decoding to be done.'
"Sydney," Jack touched her shoulder, waking her from her daydream, as the conference room filled with people.
"Alright people," Kendall stood at the head of the table waiting for everyone to take their seats. "Just moments ago, Marshall had a break through with the disks, which is why I called you all in here. Marshall." He took his seat and a very nervous Marshall stood.
I finally figured out how to crack the codes using the information I obtained from Agents Bristow, Bristow and Vaughn…. sounds like a law firm, Bristow, Bristow and Vaughn," he smiled to the very un-amused group, although Sydney did smile. "Anyway, I used the information they decoded from the Derevko file… the part about her developing a code, well I figured I might as well try it… nothing else was working… anyway, uh… oh yeah… the code that Cuvee used was the one your mother," he looked at Sydney his eyes wide in wonderment, "developed for him while she was still at the Academy… for a sixteen year old to do that, come up with something like this… is amazing… unbelievable really." He wiped the sweat on his brow. "So… yeah, I tried the code on the disks just moments ago and they are decoding now…should be finished any minute…the way the data was arranged, I think they are video files. I haven't been able to view them yet so this is a premiere of sorts I guess."
The group waited patiently as Marshall loaded the disks.
"Ok, here goes nothing." He pushed Play and everyone turned their' sights on the screen.
Grainy footage of a countdown came onto the screen and then black, a date appeared on the bottom in Russian:
November 27th, 1981
Kashmir Interrogation Prison
Sydney and Jack both tensed with memories flashing back to Irina's reaction when she told them she'd been a prisoner in Kashmir.
Out of the black an eerie familiar tune began to play amidst the sound of people shouting in Russian, mass chaos and metal clanging.
*Da Svidanya*
The tune was the old Soviet Anthem. A blurry picture came into focus and you could instantly see you were in a prison, on the second level, looking down at the lower level, while arms of prisoners, all men, behind bars reached out in front of the camera. They were smiling, some licking the bars and shouting. Hundreds, thousands maybe screaming…their hair was cut and jagged, their clothes torn and hanging off them, dirty and bloody, some missing teeth, no doubt a result of their interrogations.
The camera continued to roll as the cameraman made their way down the aisle, stopping suddenly and turning back to film the arrival of a prisoner below. Peering over the railing, six guards could be seen dragging a prisoner in. Two men in front with machine guns, two dragging the body of a prisoner by the arms, though a face couldn't be seen as the head hang limp towards the floor, and two in the rear with guns. The prisoners began going nuts.
Sydney felt her heart tightening as she saw them bringing the prisoner towards three men waiting at the end, in front of what appeared to be a 'cross.'
The guards stopped and roughly grabbed the hair, now visibly long brown, and whipped her head back. Irina's bloodied face could now be seen clearly on camera, she was conscious, but had clearly been beaten severely. She wore no regular prisoner clothes but a white sheet or sorts tied around her body loosely. Blood from her face that had been beaten stained the white cloth as it fell as did the blood from her wrists, no doubt from interrogation, running like small streams down her arms the guards held her suspended from fully collapsing on the ground.
The man standing in front of her, who's back was to the camera, could be seen conducting along to the music as if amused by it all. Then motioned and the guards swiftly jerked Irina up to eye level, forcing her onto her feet though it was clear she couldn't stand-alone. The man moved around Irina and his face finally came into view,
'Cuvee.' Jack seethed under his breath, his knuckles turning white.
He motioned for the prisoner to be quiet, which they didn't, and continued his making circles around Irina. Stopping to the side of her, he leaned near her ear and whispered something and moved to kiss her on the lips. She bit him and he did nothing, simply smiled and wiped the blood from his lip. She spat the blood from her mouth in defiance and another guard stepped in and slapped her hard.
She made no sound, simply closed her eyes for a long time and opened them again to stare straight in front of her. Two guards appeared out of nowhere, wheeling in a metal table with leather straps and another smaller table covered with a white towel. The men roughly grabbed Irina, throwing her onto the table as she struggled against them but she couldn't fight them off.
A man in a white coat uncovered the smaller table and revealed numerous torture devices. He began inserting long needles into Irina's pressure points on her neck, to which she screamed out in pain.
Cuvee loomed over her and shouted in Russian, "This woman, Tsarina Irina Nikolaevna Alexandra Dmitrievna Romanova Derevkova, our Imperial Highness…" He laughed and the prisoners roared, "Is charged with disobeying direct orders and withholding evidence that would suggest…she is a traitor to Mother Russia, turning on her own beloved Russia for the Great American Satan! Her first refusal…to terminate the bastard American spawn growing inside her after her 'target husband' impregnated her. She claimed it forged their bond and solidified her position in his life; we forgave this, seeing it as an asset. But instead of being relieved when she received her final orders to kill her 'husband' and to return to Mother Russia with the bastard child… she refused! We took action, to which she saw the error of her mistake in refusing to comply and accepted Extraction."
The prisoners again when nuts, the man in the white coat continued his pressure point torture on Irina.
Jack and Sydney felt the walls closing in on them…she was there, being tortured for having refused to kill Jack, and take Sydney with her back to Russia.
'What action had they taken to show Irina the errors of her way?'
"But imagine my surprise when she defied us again, returning without the child, and without killing her target husband!"
The man in the white coat pulled the white sheet away exposing part of her chest as a another long needle was inserted into Irina who let out another torturous scream that sent the prisoners wild with delight. He then began inserting needles under each of her finger and toenails.
"So I have to ask myself, why is this agent protecting her enemy and defying her own country? Has she fallen victim to the Great Satan? Does she actually believe she loves them? Or perhaps, that they love her? Does she need a reminder of where her loyalties should and will lie!" Cuvee reached inside his jacket and removed two photos…one of Jack and one of Sydney, both taken without Irina's or their knowledge it looked like. He held the photos above Irina's tear-stricken face. "You see Irina, you cannot 'protect' them from us, you cannot hide anything from us!" He leaned over screaming into her face. "Why would you betray your own country for them? Why?" He screamed but she wouldn't answer, and he motioned for another long needle to be inserted.
She screamed out in pain.
"Why?" he screamed again, kneeling near her face.
Again, no answer and again another long needle, was inserted into her pressure point.
"You are under a Direct Order, Agent Derevko to answer the question. Why?" He screamed into her ear.
No answer and again another needle. "No answer, you have no answer! You continue to defy us...then so be it."
"Remove the needles and restraints." He instructed. "She has committed the ultimate act of treason against Russia by siding with the enemy… protecting the enemy. She has been infected by the enemy," he walked over to where the guards were holding Irina up.
Jack had a sinking feeling taking over him that something even worse then the torture was about to happen.
"Literally… something she, 'forget' to mention. Something, that makes me believe she wasn't having, to sacrifice her body to this man, but that she actually enjoyed her 'husband' having his way with her, enjoyed his touch. Whoring yourself out to him." He seethed taking a step closer to Irina. "She must be cured. Starting by ridding herself of the spawn of the devil she carries inside her."
"Noooo!" she screamed out, a horrified look in her eyes.
And with that, Cuvee landed a solid right punch, directly into Irina's abdomen...then a left, then a right again. She fell breathless to her knees.
The prisoners went crazy again and Cuvee nodded to the guards, they proceeded to kick her in the abdomen, as she lay curled in the fetal position on the cold cement floor of the prison, trying desperately to protect herself and the baby inside her. The punishing blows went on for what seemed like ever, before Cuvee put his hand up to stop them. Irina lay motionless on the ground.
Jack felt as though he was about to explode, he wanted to kill Cuvee with his bare hands…reach through the screen and kill him, stop him from hurting Irina, from killing their baby…but he realized he couldn't. This was a film about events that happened twenty-one years ago… and he could do nothing.
Cuvee knelt beside her. "Oh, Irina… what has he done to you? You were one of the best." His fingers brushing the hair off her cheek as she lay there. "Why are you doing this to yourself, Irina? Right now, the man you are sacrificing yourself for…has just found out what you really are… and 'hates' you. From this point on, all he'll see and feel is hate when he thinks about your deception. Your every move, every word is going to be analyzed… and thought of as a lie. He will begin to look at your child and see that hate he feels for you in her, the product of your mission and nothing more. You've destroyed him; you've destroyed your daughter. You should have followed the order and killed him. At least then, he would never have known his entire life was based on a lie… never known what you really are…" He motioned the guards and they pulled her up, her head limp against her chest. Cuvee roughly grabbed her face and forced her to look at him. "Our Royal Russian Whore." He dropped her head and motioned the guards again. "Put her on display as an example of what happens when you betray your government for the enemy. She is like our very own Jesus Christ…we are going to 'rid' her of all her 'sins' with the Americans and resurrect her as a Russian again."
The men proceeded to tie Irina's wrists to the cross and then her feet. Cuvee walked over and tucked the two photos of Jack and Sydney into the robe, facing out for everyone to see. The officers cranked a lever and the cross with Irina lifted off the ground and into the air, on display for all. Her once white robes, now red with the blood seeping from her body, the baby she tried so desperately to save, lost…
The camera passed the screaming prisoners, still excited over their new female inmate, for a close-up of Irina. Though her long hair hid most of her face, you could tell that she had passed out, and the blood from a cut on her face dripping onto the faces of Jack and Sydney.
"I'm going to be sick." Marshall burped, trying to swallow the bile rising in his stomach and ran for the door.
"Yeah." Weiss bolted for the door as well.
Dixon reached over and pressed pause right at the picture faded to black and a new date appeared:
December 15th, 1981
With the date frozen on the screen Sydney put her head in her hands, trying desperately to process what she'd just seen.
Nothing could have prepared her for it, or Jack who was suddenly staring at his daughter, as if only now just realizing she had witnessed the horrific film as well.
Everyone left in the room sat in silence, not knowing what to say, and waiting for the others to return.
'Royal Russian Whore' Jack's mind kept repeating the phrase over and over, he had told her she was 'nothing but a Royal Russian Whore' the other night when she slapped him, he could now see why.
The bastard Cuvee, who Jack was positively going to hunt down and kill now, had called Irina that because she refused to leave 'him' JACK, because she tried to protect 'their' baby inside her…and Jack had only re-affirmed to Irina, what Cuvee said when he'd called her the same thing… he felt himself getting ill at the thought.
Weiss and Marshall returned again, both looking ill and Marshall carrying a small waste paper can. Sydney wiped a steam of tears running down her face and Vaughn placed his hand over hers.
"Syd, maybe you shouldn't watch this. No one should have to see their mother being tortured like this."
"No…" she began to protest but was cut off by her father who spoke quietly.
"Sydney, he's right. You shouldn't be seeing this."
"Dad, I should be here just like everyone else… maybe more so because I am her daughter and I helped to put her in that God forsaken prison…"
"Sydney, you didn't…" Vaughn began but she angrily cut him off.
"Yes, I did… she refused her superiors because she didn't want to leave us Vaughn, and this is my one chance to see, for myself, what happened. We are all so quick to point out the horrible things 'this monster' has done to other people, myself included, but what about the things that have been done to her? We shouldn't see them because it would it would what, humanize her? If we hadn't just watched that… none of us would know that she betrayed the KGB in order to save my father's life. I think we, or at least I… owe it to her to find out what she went through. I need to understand… I'm staying." Sydney's resolve to stay and prove she could handle it took over, "Go ahead Marshall, push Play." She nodded at him with a confidence she didn't feel.
*An Angel Falls*
Marshall looked to Jack, silently asking for permission. Jack nodded slowly and the film began to Play again.
The film began much the same as the other, with cameraman filming from the second story looking down as the guards drug Irina to the waiting men. She was now clothed in the traditional prison garb: blue shirt and pants that resembled scrubs but she had no shoes. She was terribly thin, her cheeks sunken in, her clothes hanging on her frame. Irina was putting up quite the struggle even with her hands cuffed behind her back, the guards moving too quickly for her to find her footing. They stopped at the end once again, in front of the cross where they'd left her hanging the last time. The prisoners began rioting once again at seeing Irina. A guard shouted for her to kneel but Irina remained still, defiant. He cracked her across the back of the legs with a club and she fell to her knees.
"Happy Birthday Irina." Cuvee smiled down at her. "They tell me, that you've not been cooperating. Naughty girl… naughty, naughty, naughty." He shook his finger back and forth as he paced in front of her. "Such a wild free spirit you have, so strong willed. Your time here… would be much more enjoyable, if you'd just give in. Answer our questions… promise to be a good little spy from now on… and prove your loyalty to me, instead of that pig you called a husband." He smiled brushing the skin on Irina's neck with his fingers in a suggestive manner following the curve of the neckline to her chest.
Irina refused to look at him. "You're the pig." She hissed and was promptly backhanded by one of the guards, the force breaking her lip open.
"Every wild horse can be broken."
His leer at Irina was nauseating to everyone in the conference room. Sydney instantly had a flashback of Cuvee reminding her mother of the same thing when he'd been threatening Sydney in Moscow.
"Her beloved American 'husband' has tainted our beautiful Russian woman gentlemen," He smiled to the guards standing watch, " I believe she is now disgusted by the touch of a real man… a Russian man." He ran his fingers over the back of Irina's hair. "In honor of your birthday, we will celebrate by giving you a re-birth… a chance to rethink your position on your countrymen and make life easier on you." He cupped Irina's face looking into her eyes.
Without speaking the words, everyone knew exactly what that meant. Sleep with Cuvee or face the consequences of torture.
"Never." Irina turned her face away from his touch.
"But I would have been so gentle." He smiled back before standing to face the guards. "I believe she needs persuasion," He nodded to the men who immediately, and roughly hauled Irina to her feet.
Irina's face flashed with fear as two men brought a table into the center. She tried to fight them, but her arms were still cuffed behind her back. Two guards came to help hold her as the other two re-cuffed her flat against the table. One hand at each of the far ends; the table stopping to support her just at her hips, leaving her legs dangling over the side. Knowing this was not going to be good she tried desperately to pull on her restraints.
"You brought this on yourself, Irina. I gave you a chance. You will come to loathe Jack Bristow, I guarantee it." He kissed her on the side of her mouth and signaled one of the officers next to him. "She's all yours boys."
Irina started screaming hysterically in a panicked chant, "No! No! No!" And pulling roughly against the cuffs on her wrists, keeping an eye on the man undoing and removing his ammo belt, gun and hat in front of her with a nasty gleam in his eye.
"No! No! No!" Irina continued chanting, somehow willing the words to stop the actions.
Cuvee seemed to be amused at Irina struggling, "And when all of you are done," he looked to the eight guards around him, "give the prisoners in Cell-block A, a round with her. Prisoners who cooperate deserve rewards; it's been awhile since they've been with a woman. I think they'll enjoy a round with a beautiful woman and what a coincidence there are exactly nineteen of them, twenty-seven in all… one for each year you've been alive." Cuvee laughed and walked away.
Irina's eyes grew wider in horror as the prisoners responded with loud cheering and shaking of their bars. She pulled desperately at the cuffs, her wrists bleeding with her efforts. The harder she pulled on them the more they'd bleed. Tears coming to her eyes as she watched the man walk towards her. She started violently swinging her legs and kicking the man as he tried to get close to her. One swift kick nailed him just outside his groin, narrowly missing the intended target.
"Bitch!" He seethed in Russian and tried again, motioning for his fellow guards to help him in the cause. She violently fought with all her might, pulling as hard as she could against the restraints and kicking madly at the men.
Seeing the men were winning she pulled as hard as she could against one of her restraints, whimpering with pain etched in her face as she pulled harder and harder, the metal digging into the already open wound she had there. She kept pulling and kicking unwilling to give up. Suddenly there was a loud 'pop' and Irina screamed out in pain as she had effectively dislocated her shoulder. She kept up the assault with her legs and then Irina felt a sharp jab into her hip and realized the man in the white coat was back, and had just injected her with something. He nodded to the guards and soon after Irina felt the energy draining from her body, it was becoming more and more difficult to move her legs.
"I've just given you something to temporarily paralyze you. You will be fully conscious, feel everything, but won't be able to move or speak soon." The man stated without an expression.
Irina let out one last cry of desperation as the tears began to fall, "Jaaaaack!" Her blood-curdling scream faded as she began losing the battle with the drugs. Her face turned to the side, directly facing another camera on the ground floor, just a few feet away. Tears could be seen running over the bridge of her nose falling onto the cold metal table. Her struggle for freedom had caused her metal handcuffs to rip into her flesh all the way to the bone. With one last gasp she whispered, "Jack," looking directly into the camera as if somehow begging him to save her from this fate.
*Adagio for Strings*
Jack felt as though his heart had been ripped out hearing her begging him to save her. The look in her eyes sending shivers down his spine. He couldn't swallow, he couldn't breathe, he couldn't move…all he could do was sit and watch as the horror continued. He wasn't seeing Irina Derevko the woman who'd betrayed him, the killer and terrorist mafia leader… he saw his wife, the love of his life, the mother of his child.
The guard gently grabbed the top of her pants, hesitating a moment to caress the soft skin of her stomach with his fingers. Giving her a disgusting look, he took both hands and violently ripped her pants off. He undid his trousers; pants falling to his knees, grabbed Irina's hips forcefully and proceeded, in violating her in the worst way a woman could be violated. Pain, anger, and sheer-torment could be seen racing through Irina's dark brown eyes, they spoke volumes for what her mouth could not.
The prisoners shouted and gyrated their hips against the bars in a disgusting manor, matching the guard's thrusts with their own. He reached under Irina's shirt forcefully grabbing her breast. It wasn't enough and he ripped her shirt down the middle, exposing her fully. Another roar surged through the prison and the guards could be seen smiling at her naked form, lying helplessly strapped to the table.
When he finished, another guard stepped in, and then another, and another… each quicker in their' 'release' from watching the men before. Then prisoner after prisoner had their turn, Irina's tears never stopping, her eyes never leaving the camera to look at the men having their way with her.
The footage cutting back and forth between a close-up of Irina's reaction and then switching to a wider view of the entire act of the men violating her.
Jack felt Irina's eyes bearing into his soul. Just as he was about to yell for Marshall to stop the footage, as he couldn't take anymore, the screen went to black. He had tried to concentrate on her eyes, not the horrible acts being committed against her, willing her somehow to see that he wasn't leaving her, she wasn't alone, she would survive this… the thought absurd to him now in reflection. This was the past, she was alone; he wasn't there because 'she' had left him. Jack felt his eyes getting blurry and realized he was on the verge of tears, thankful for the dimmed lights so no one could see his emotions. But looking up he saw Sydney was visibly crying, the tears streaming down her cheeks. He could hear Marshall sniffing behind him, conceivably in tears as well, and as he looked around the room he saw pools of liquid glistening in the eyes of some of Irina's toughest critics to his surprise, Dixon, Kendall, and even Vaughn.
'How could they not?' You would have to be made of stone not to get emotional over the gang rape of a woman, even if that woman was Irina Derevko.
The footage rolled on and various dates passed by, all snippets of film from her various torture sessions. The dates causing memories to mix in the minds of Jack and Sydney, for example: on Christmas, Irina was being tortured with electrocution; Jack's birthday, she was raped and had needles stuck in her eyes; Sydney's seventh birthday was pressure point incision torture with flames burning the souls of her feet.
Of course, not all the dates listed held such significance but the torture was present none the less: electrocution, flames to the bottom of her feet, teeth extraction, needles to the eyes, and of course pressure point incisions, truth serums and physical beatings, and more sessions of rape.
Marshall understanding now, why the woman in the cell that day…was so tough, and Jack, her 'this is nothing…' comment in Panama when he removed the tracker.
They'd all seen torture before, committed the acts themselves even…but no one was as ruthless as the KGB when it came to punishing torture. Irina's appearance and health seemed to deteriorate everyday that passed and finally, a date they recognized as her attempted escape May 27th, 1982. The footage went by quickly but was horrifying none-the-less.
An unconscious Irina, who'd been beaten very badly from her appearance, was drug across the floor by one arm and into a room with a small hole of light; the door was slammed and locked. The next date to appear was the date of her release from solitary March 30th, 1983. The door opened and a very weak Irina was escorted out. She immediately shunned at the light, after not having seen it in quite some time, hiding behind her now incredibly long hair. The prison clothes that had hung on her body before; now covered only a skeleton. Her bones could visibly be made out as they protruded through the fabric. Her shoulders, sternum and ribs, spine…all of them like jagged edge, the skin now drooping between the bones, of her once muscular arms.
"God, she looks like a Holocaust victim." Kendall said softly, none of the usual venom it carried when he spoke of Irina Derevko, no hate or anger in his voice, only empathy for someone who had survived so much. The once breathtaking woman had become a bag of bones.
As the man in the white coat inspected Irina on the screen, it wasn't her appearance, though that was bad enough, that haunted Jack… it was the look in Irina's eyes. Her once beautiful, soul-full eyes, full of life, light, wonder, and intrigue were now hollow and dull. Jack searched but there was no light, no sparkle, no recognition, at all. Her soul, her life… gone… they had succeeded in breaking her spirit. She spoke nothing, only nodded her head 'yes' or 'no' in compliance to the questions asked.
June 17th, 1983
The day they knew of as Irina's release from prison. The footage began facing an empty table. Two men entered and took seats on one side of the table, their backs to the camera. Something about this seemed familiar to both Jack and Sydney but they couldn't place it. Suddenly, it clicked for both of them as a healthier looking Irina took her seat on the opposite side of the table. This was the tape of her debriefing. The men: Cuvee and Khasinau.
CIA already had the debriefing in their possession, with what they thought was her real KGB file. Jack had memorized every agonizing word as he'd watched it many times before, her harsh words about him biting at his very soul.
Now as he watched the same tape he realized, it had been filmed years after her extraction…Years she spent in a torturous hellhole suffering the consequences of betraying the KGB for him…for saving his life and their daughter's.
She had been broken, rebuilt and reprogrammed. He could see that now in her perfectly phrased answers. She was being the 'good little loyal spy' Cuvee had said she would be. She was proving her loyalty for him, and her disgust for Jack.
"How can she just sit there like that, across the table from that man? After everything he did to her, she berates you! Says you're the fool! She's the fool for sitting there and not reaching over the table and strangling him! How could she?" Sydney's emotions had been through the gauntlet today and she wasn't thinking clearly, her tears and pain for what her mother had been through, confused by how she was capable of giving her loyalty back to him. She knew the obvious reasons why, but she needed them pointed out to her.
"Sydney," Jack spoke softly, looking from the video playing of Irina's debriefing and back to his daughter, "they broke her… A human being can only take so much. She must have realized, that she had to comply or die in that Godforsaken place… She chose to comply and survive."
Jack had summed it up and brought it home to everyone, Irina Derevko was a human being. Something none of them had wanted to see until it was right in front of them, forced upon them by witnessing the tragedies against her.
They had always referred to her as the, 'heartless cold blooded monster' who had no emotions because she showed, no emotions. Now, they could see a glimpse of why.
The group sat in silence, lost in thought, believing the video files were over with when flashes of light and a dark grainy image appeared. A man was standing in front of the camera holding a Russian newspaper.
"Can anybody read that date?" Kendall asked quickly.
"November 10th, 1981." Dixon jumped up and stood in front of the screen, reading the newspaper print. Alarm bells immediately going off in Vaughn, Jack and Sydney's heads.
Three days before Irina had received her second set of orders after refusing the first. Dixon took his seat again and the man on the screen turned around, revealing two other people behind him.
An older woman in her late sixties or earlier seventies, they guessed at her age, sat gagged in a chair, her arms apparently tied behind her back. The older woman was remarkably beautifully and the striking resemblance to Irina was hard to miss. A man stood behind her, the woman was visibly upset. The man who had been holding the newspaper stood off to the side of the woman now, looking intently at the woman and then at the camera.
"You have defied your KGB orders and in doing so you have betrayed Mother Russia, literally…betrayed your own mother." He glanced down at the older woman. "Your defiance will not go unpunished." He nodded his head at the other man, who raised a gun to the temple of the woman, then removed the gag in her mouth.
The newspaperman knelt beside the woman, "Do you have any last words for your traitorous daughter Anastasia, excuse me…Your Imperial Majesty: Tsarina Anastasia, Empress of all Russias. How clumsy of me to forget your long lost title."His sickening smile had no apparent affect on the woman who continued to stare intently at the camera.
"Sweetheart, love abides by no boundaries or laws made by man…only the heart. I understand your love for your family… and I forgive you, Irina. I love you forever and always…" With tears streaming down her cheeks the woman smiled and the man pulled the trigger.
"Well that was touching." Spoken with no emotion as he wiped the blood sprays from his jacket. Taking a step forward from her body he turned his gaze directly into the camera. "Do not' make the same mistake of defying the order of extraction again! Or we will be forced to kill the other precious girl in your life…" He reached into his pocket and held out a picture of Sydney playing in the yard, proving they had access to her, to the camera, "This time, in front of you… just before you die."
The men left the area, the last visible image was Irina's mother slumped to the side… blood pooling around the chair from her body, then blackness.
"Oh my God!" Sydney shrieked in terror; new tears springing forth realizing she'd just watched her grandmother's execution. Suddenly understanding why her mother had to leave her…if she hadn't, they would have killed them all. Her grandmother's words ringing in her ears… Irina had refused to leave because of her love for Jack and Sydney, a choice that cost her own mother's life. Sydney couldn't take anymore and ran out of the room, followed quickly by Vaughn.
All these years, Jack had thought he and Sydney were the only ones suffering the fallout of Irina's mission…but he was wrong, Irina had suffered just as much, maybe more. He at least had Sydney to get him through… Irina had lost them, her mother… the baby… her spirit. He was being to see now, why she became so obsessed with the Rambaldi Prophecy, it was the only part of her, she had left… trying to fill in the missing pieces, the void losing everything must have created in her.
'Oh why didn't I just listen to her?' Jack fumed inside. Not that he would have listened to anything she said; 'she lied about everything,' this Jack was always certain after he learned the 'truth' about her long ago… What he was being to realize now, was that the biggest lie of all was the lie of omission… So many things he never knew about. So many questions he still had. He needed to find her. They had to talk.
"Jack," Dixon's soft voice broke into Jack's reverie, "Are you ok?"
Jack seemed surprised by the question and was immediately defensive. "Yes, of course. Why would you ask something like that?" Jack began collecting the papers in front of him.
"Because today we all saw some pretty traumatic things…things that are very personal to you, false pretenses or not…she was your wife and the mother of your child."
Jack stopped shuffling the papers to glare at Dixon.
Kendall jumped in and saved Dixon, "Jack, you've been sitting there for the last five minutes staring at the table. Don't pretend this didn't effect you, hell… it affected me… affected all of us." His tone softer, "Go home… it's been a long day."
"No, we need to start analyzing this information so we can find…" Jack began to protest, not really wanting to go back to home to a very empty house alone.
"Jack, it can wait... and we will find her." Knowing exactly what Jack was thinking and for the first time, his own tone softening when thinking about finding Irina. "I want to go home too. Shit, Jack, I need a drink or two…Go home."
Jack nodded in agreement and walked out of the office, hoping to find Sydney. She was nowhere to be seen and though he wanted to wait, he couldn't stand the scrutiny of the eyes on him. Everyone was already talking about 'the Irina Derevko files.' 'Bad news travels fast.' He shook his head; he had to find Sydney… he couldn't leave until he'd seen her.
Sydney had bolted out of the door and straight into the ladies room, where she finally gave into the nausea she'd been feeling since the film on her mother began.
As if throwing up the contents in her stomach would somehow expel the horrible images of her mother from her mind.
Vaughn tapped on the stall door, "You ok?" He heard the flush of the toilet and backed away letting Sydney out.
"You aren't supposed to be in here." She tried to smile at him going to the sink to wash her hands.
"Syd… you can talk to me, it's ok." He spoke softly and Sydney looked into the mirror to meet his eyes.
"No, Vaughn, I can't…not about this…not about my mother. This doesn't change the fact that she killed your father."
"Yes, I know that. But it does force me to see her as more then your mother and my father's killer… Syd," he grabbed her shoulder turning her towards him, "What we saw today… I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. I wouldn't wish on Irina Derevko. Up until today, I always thought of her as a killing machine… a killing machine with no feelings, no emotion…her only loyalties to herself. I saw what happened to her for disobeying an order… Killing my father, was an order. Part of me wants to say she could have refused to kill him if she wanted to, like she had refused to kill your father… but knowing now what that cost her... that they were blackmailing her with your life if she refused… I don't know… she killed my father but saved your life… I just don't know what to think right now." He pulled her close and held her as the tears began to fall again.
"If this is what she meant by 'Truth Takes Time' then, Vaughn, I don't know how much more truth I can stand… but I have to, I have to know it all, now more then ever. I have so many questions for her, so many things that still don't make sense... so many things I want to understand. Vaughn, I don't remember anything around the time my mother 'died' because of the Project Christmas training… but I had to have been there when she found out about her mother, my grandmother. My father was on a mission, but those last few days… was just my mother and me… I have to remember what she said." Sydney pulled out of his arms, and Vaughn knew where she was heading. He didn't stop her, knowing how badly she needed to put the missing pieces of her life together.