This story picks up where the Bioweapon left off. Sydney just activated the Sphere of Life, resurrecting everyone that she has ever had physical contact with. I plan to bring back some characters that aren't dead, too.
I hope you enjoy this story.
I would also recommend reading the Bioweapon before reading this.
Alias is not mine. It belongs to ABC, JJ Abrams, Bad robot, and anyone else who owns the copyright.
Fallout
Prologue
Sydney got in her car and drove to her house. “Shovels,” she thought, “must get shovels.” She fumbled with her keys, trying desperately to get the right one in the lock. She had got the key in when Nadia opened the door for her. Sydney sprinted in. She got in old clothes, and then went to the small garage behind the apartment building. She found three shovels in there, grabbed them and went back through her apartment.
“Nadia? Weiss? Are you busy?”
“No. What do you need?” Nadia responded, a curious look on her face.
“Weiss?”
“I’m not busy, either,” he said, shaking his head. “What do you need?”
“Could you both drive down to Mercy Angel Cemetery with me? If Mom is right, when I activated the Sphere of Life I brought them back from the dead.”
“Them?” Nadia asked.
“Everyone that I know that has died is now alive.” Sydney replied. “Dad, Francie, Danny, oh gosh, Danny, Sloane, Emily, Diane,” Sydney said rattling them off. Suddenly her face changed. “felgercarb. If Mom’s right, that also means I’ve brought back Lauren.” Sydney cursed. “Allison and Noah,” she said quietly. “They’re all alive.”
“What do you need us for,” Weiss said, voicing the part he didn’t understand.
“I need help digging them up. They were resurrected in their caskets.”
“We can help,” Nadia said, getting up to change.
“Of course,” Weiss said, “but I need to change, too. Don’t want to be digging up caskets in my suit.” He laughed quietly. While they went to change, Sydney called Dixon, Marshall, Vaughn, and then Meagan. They were having trouble believing her, but they all agreed to meet her there with a shovel.
Five minutes later...
The group all pulled up to the cemetery about the same time. Sydney rushed to Jack’s gravesite and plunged the shovel into the soft earth. Pushing that shovel full aside, she plunged the shovel again, and again, and again. After digging for a while, she got the coffin open, but it was too late. Jack was dead. However, his skin looked flushed and he still had body heat. She knew he had suffocated. She realized that if all who were alive were dead, all she’d have to do is activate the Sphere of Life again.
As it turned out, no one was able to get to the people they dug up in time, so Sydney and everyone else put one of the corpses in their car and drove to the safe house. When they got there, Sydney activated the Sphere of Life again, and after the noise subsided, all the people that had been corpses a few seconds before were now getting up and looking around, confused. When Sydney finally saw Jack, she ran to him, hugging him tight. The embrace would’ve lasted a long time if Sydney hadn’t heard Danny say, “Sydney? Is that you?”
“Danny!” Sydney exclaimed. She broke the embrace with Jack and ran over to him. She looked into his eyes. “Danny? I can’t believe it’s you.” They hugged for just a short time. Danny saw a <O> on his hand and stopped.
“What’s this?” he asked, utterly clueless to why he had such a weird inscription on his hand. Sydney looked at it.
“It’s nothing. Well, nothing major anyway.” Sydney didn’t want to tell him. She told Danny to wait and went over to Jack. She looked at his hand. There it was: <O>.
She went over to Emily. Sloane and Emily were in a tight embrace, but she saw the <O> on both their hands. Diane had it, too. She went over to Danny again. “I guess you’re not the only one that has it.” They started to hug again, but almost as soon as they touched each other, Sydney’s house phone rang.
Walking over to get it, Sydney was overcome with the full ramifications of what she had done. Here were people that had been dead for some time suddenly reintroduced to the world without explanation. She realized that they were most likely experiencing what she herself had when Vaughn had told her that she had been missing for two years.
She realized that she had done to Danny what Vaughn had done to her. She had moved on. Here he was, feeling like it was one day, finding out six years had passed, and the girl he was just engaged to was engaged to someone else. Then she caught herself; Danny didn’t know about her and Vaughn. She’d have to tell him sometime soon.
“Sydney,” she said when she picked up the phone. An automated voice came on.
“You have a collect call from a ‘Sydney it’s me, Francie.’ Do you wish to accept the charges?”
“Yes,” she said, and for the first time in four and a half years, talked to her best friend that had become a casualty of Sydney's job.
“Sydney,” she said.
“Syd?” her former roommates voice came over the phone. “Help me, please!”
“What’s going on?”
“I’m on the beach, and I,” a long pause, “I don’t have any clothes.”
“What?”
“I just woke up, and, well, I’m here and I’m naked.”
Sydney didn’t understand how this fit with everyone else’s resurrection. Grabbing some clothes, she drove out to the beach, and, after Francie got dressed, they both went back to the safe house.
After the reunion between Francie and Danny, Sydney spoke up. "Can I have your attention, please? You are all here, but if you think about it, a few of you don't have a place to stay. Dad, you have two extra bedrooms at your house, would you mind if some people stayed with you until they get back on their feet?"
"No, just as long as they don't make a mess."
"Can I stay with you, Mr. Bristow?" Danny asked.
"Sure," he said, and Danny thanked him.
"Can I?" Francie asked.
"I suppose." Francie, Danny, and Jack all went outside before Jack realized that he didn't have his car. Sydney drove her Dad over to his house, and he drove back and took Francie and Danny.
Diane and Dixon left, with Dixon thanking Sydney before he left.
Emily and Arvin both left after that, leaving Sydney, Nadia, Noah, Vaughn, and Weiss alone in the safe house. Vaughn reluctantly agreed to let Noah stay at his apartment, and Sydney invited Vaughn to move in with her. After dropping Noah off, Vaughn got the stuff he needed, taking it out to Sydney's car, and then he went back in and got his guns, knives, and ice pick. "I am not going to supply him with his weapons," is the justification he gave to Sydney.
When they got back to Sydney's apartment, she helped Vaughn unpack, and then told him to sit down at the table. "Vaughn," she started, "we need to talk."
"What about?"
"Vaughn, I'm pregnant."
...TBC...
Here is Chapter One. I hope you enjoy this story.
Let me know what you think.
Chapter 1
So it Begins
“Vaughn? Vaughn, did you hear me?”
“Yeah,” he said slowly, “congratulations.”
“You’re the father,” she replied, trying to get him to react.
“I figured as much. Wow, you and Nadia.”
“Nadia?” Sydney asked surprised.
“Weiss called me one day and told me that he found a pregnancy test in the trash one day, and when he was about ready to ask her about it, he saw her call Meagan and tell her she wouldn’t believe what she had just learned. He called me and told me.”
“Nadia hasn’t mentioned anything to me. Did you consider the fact that Nadia was talking about me?”
“You told Nadia before you told me?” Vaughn asked, betrayal apparent in his voice.
“I live with her. I knew she’d find out soon enough, so I told her. I was going to tell you earlier, but I didn’t know how to break it. I was going to tell you today before I activated the Sphere of Life. I decided that I shouldn’t put it off any longer even though today was such an overwhelming…” Sydney’s phone rang. “Sydney,” she said.
“Sydney, it’s Dixon. I know it’s kind of late, but have you...” he started, but then changed direction. “Vaughn’s there with you, right?”
“Yeah, he’s right here. Do you want to talk to him?”
“No. I just wanted to ask you two if you were free Tuesday."
“Who is it?” Vaughn asked quietly.
“Dixon,” Sydney mouthed
“Sydney, are you there?”
“Yeah.”
“Listen, Diane and I would like to take you out to eat to show our appreciation. How does Tuesday at 8:00 sound?”
“Tuesday at 8:00?” Sydney asked Vaughn.
“What? What’s going on then?”
“Are you free? Dixon and Diane want to take us out to eat. Does that work?”
“I’m free. If it works for you, it’ll work for me.”
“That’ll be fine,” Sydney confirmed.
“We’ll see you then.”
“Bye,” Sydney said, hanging up.
“Dinner at 8:00 on Tuesday?” Vaughn asked.
“Right,” Sydney said, and went over and marked it on the calendar.
~ ~ ~
“Can I help you, sir?” the bank teller asked.
“Yes. I’d like to make a withdrawal,” Noah replied.
~ ~ ~
“She agreed to the dinner,” Dixon said, looking intensely at Diane. “To change the topic, how should we tell Robin and Steven?”
“Tell them you’ve got a surprise for them. Then open the door, and I’ll come in. It’ll be like one of those grand reveals like on those makeover TV shows.”
“Okay,” Dixon said. "However I never took you as a fan of those reality shows."
"There were a few I liked," Diane told him.
The moment Dixon walked in through his garage door, he could tell that something was up. “What is it?” he asked.
“Steven is fl…” Robin started.
“Shut up,” Steven hissed quietly. “Hello, Daddy,” he then proceeded to say, a big, fake grin on his face.
“What’s going on?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all.” Steven said again, the fake grin unchanging. That was when Dixon saw a piece of paper that Steven was trying to hide behind his back.
“What’s that?” he asked, pointing at the paper as best as he could.
“What’s what?” Steven said back.
“Hand it over,” Dixon demanded.
The smile vanished. Steven handed the sheet over. Dixon’s eyes swept over it. It was Steven’s report card. At first, Dixon didn’t see why Steven had been hiding it. He saw mostly A’s and B’s. Then his eyes fell on the English grade. D-. Dixon shook his head. “Robin, get in here, please.”
The glare Steven gave Robin was cold, but Dixon immediately demanded their attention. “I have a surprise for you,” he said, getting it out.
“What is it?” Robin asked.
Dixon opened the door and revealed Diane standing in the doorway.
~ ~ ~
The doorbell rang. Jack climbed out of bed and maneuvered his way around the boxes that Sydney had packed in preparation for the auction. “I’ll have to unpack,” he thought to himself. Jack got to the front door, and looked through the peephole. He saw Noah standing outside. Though he didn’t like Noah, he opened the door anyway.
“What is it?” Jack said abruptly.
“Good evening to you, too,” Noah said sarcastically. “May I come in?”
Jack stepped out of the way and Noah stepped in. “I assume there’s a reason you’re here,” Jack said, “I already have a full guest list.”
“Down to business, huh?” Noah said. He handed Jack three pieces of paper. “After coming back from the dead, I realized that I would have nothing. That was when I remembered that I had the bank accounts that I had made from my income as ‘The Snowman.’ I withdrew $5 million dollars from a collection of those accounts. I just thought that I could help others that Sydney brought back find their footing. Those are three accounts, each with one million dollars in them to help you, Danny, and Francie get back into the swing of things.”
“I don’t need this. I still have a house, a car, and a job. Give this to someone else. As for Danny and Francie, I’ll make sure they get them.” Jack handed Noah back one of the slips of paper.
Noah took it and nodded. “Good night,” he said, and went outside to his Firebird and backed out quickly. Jack watched as he drove away, and then put the papers in his desk drawer, and went back to bed.
That night, Jack didn’t get much sleep. Every time he drifted off, he remembered the fire and the smoke. The smell had been so bad. He remembered the screams the whole time. He was about to doze off again when he heard a creak outside his door. Slipping out of bed quietly, he went over to a loose floorboard, picked it up, and then grabbed out his gun. He checked the magazine. It was full. He turned the safety off, put a bullet in the chamber and stealthily snuck into the hall. He saw a light on in the kitchen.
Jack went down the stairs. He could hear cabinet doors being opened. He quickly turned into the kitchen with his gun drawn.
~ ~ ~
“Dad,” Steven said quietly, “who’s that? She looks just like Mom.”
“Stevie,” Diane said, arms open.
“Mom,” Steven and Robin both said at the same time. They ran to her and the scene was that of such love.
~ ~ ~
“Whoa, Mr. Bristow! What are you doing?”
Jack lowered his gun. “Danny! I could ask you the same thing.”
“I couldn’t sleep. I kept having nightmares. I thought I’d get a glass of nice warm milk.”
“Good in theory,” Jack started, “but you might want to make sure I’ve got milk.” He opened the fridge. The light didn’t come on. It had been unplugged ever since Sydney had emptied his fridge. “As for cups,” Jack said, “Your guess is as good as mine.” Jack pointed at all the boxes in the living room. My guess is that one of those has it.”
Francie soon came downstairs and was at first hesitant to enter the room when she saw Jack’s gun.
“Is that really necessary?” she asked.
“I thought I was being robbed,” he said. “Sorry to wake you up.”
“I was already awake. I couldn’t sleep.”
They all talked about what they remembered from the afterlife, and eventually Jack said, “There’s no way I’ll be able to get to sleep tonight. At least not without some help.” Jack, Francie, and Danny all went out to Jack’s car, and when they found a 24-hour pharmacy, Jack went in and bought some sleeping pills. When they got back to his apartment, they each took a dose, bid each other good night, and went to their bedrooms.
As Francie lay in bed, getting ever more tired by the passing minute, she remembered back to college. She remembered how she had managed to hide her dependence on sleep aids for so long. Before she fell asleep, she thought, “Please don’t make me go through that again.”
~ ~ ~
“Call the medic!” the guard barked at another guard as Katya bent over in pain. She hadn’t been mentioning her contractions when they had been minor, but now that her water had broke, she knew it was time. “Call Jack Bristow,” she told the guard. “I want him to be there for the birth of his son,” she said.
The phone rang several times before the guard hung up. There was no answer.
As they wheeled Katya down to the medical lab, Jack slept peacefully through the birth of his second child.
...TBC...
Chapter 2
A Free Agent
The doorbell rang the next morning. Groggily, Jack got up, and, even though he had to dodge boxes, he managed to get to the door quickly.
“Rise and shine,” Sydney said as she slipped past Jack and into his house. “It feels so weird,” she said.
“What does?”
“I’ve been packing up your stuff, getting everything ready to clear out your house, and that’s when you decide your sick of being dead.” Sydney was joking, but what she said was slightly true.
“Actually, I didn’t decide I was sick of being dead. You decided that I was sick of being dead. Guess what? You were right,” Jack said with his usual stone-serious face.
“Get dressed,” Sydney said, out of the clear blue.
“They don’t need me at work already, do they?”
“No. Once you get dressed, I’m taking you to the hospital to see your son.”
“WHAT?!” Jack demanded. “I don’t have a son.”
“You do now; Katya had her baby last night.”
“Katya was pregnant?”
“WITH YOUR CHILD,” Sydney said emphasizing each word to make sure he got what she was saying.
“My child.” Jack repeated, as the realization finally flickered across his face.
“My half-brother,” Sydney said, “or you could say that he’s my cousin.”
“What was I thinking?” Jack asked, mostly to himself.
“I don’t know, but get ready. Your clothes are in those boxes over there.”
As Jack went upstairs to shower and dress, Sydney went into the kitchen to wait. When she saw Jacks 9mm, she quickly put on the safety, ejected the magazine, and then emptied the chamber. She got up and started to peruse, but when she spotted the sleeping pills, she stopped, remembering the night that Francie told her about her addiction. Sydney had helped her break the habit then, and she was going to help now. She pocketed the pills, knowing that she’d have to broach the topic while they drove to the hospital.
~ ~ ~
Sydney saw another side of her father than she had seen for a long time. As he held the little baby, she could actually detect a smile on his face. “What are you going to name him?” she asked.
“I should probably talk to Katya before I say anything.”
He proceeded to do that, and about an hour later he returned. “She said she wouldn’t mind if we named him Jonathan Donahue Bristow, Jr.”
“Is he going to stay with you?”
“There’s really nothing else we can do, considering the fact that I won’t allow him to be raised in prison.”
“There is one more possibility,” Sydney said, “provided Vaughn’s okay with it.”
~ ~ ~
“Marshall, could you come in here, please?” Carrie called out after hanging up the phone. He came rushing in, wondering what was going on. “Marshall, how much do you love me?”
Knowing that Carrie had just set a trap, he knew he had to tread gingerly.
“I love you more than anything, well, excluding Mitchell, and by that I don’t mean that I don’t love Mitchell, because I do, what I really meant is that, well, you know, that my love for you and Mitchell is equal. I love you so much.”
“Would you do anything for me?” she asked, and Marshall knew the request was about to come out.
“Of course, provided it’s legal.”
“It’s legal. Marshall, would you mind if,” Carrie started and then went on to make her request.
~ ~ ~
Danny woke up in Jack’s guest room. He didn’t know what to do, considering that he had no money, nothing at all. He decided to look for a TV to watch, but as he explored Jack’s house, he didn’t find anything. Not the TV anyway. As he looked around in the small room in the basement, he realized that all was not as it seemed with Jack Bristow.
~ ~ ~
Irina was sitting in the living room watching TV when she decided to call Sydney. She had remembered Sydney calling her the night before and asking her why her friend had appeared naked when she had activated the Sphere of Life. After Irina answered that it was due to the fact that the clothes weren’t organic, and therefore wouldn’t rematerialize like her friend did, she wondered what had happened.
How were things going with her having people she thought were dead suddenly being put back in her life? She went over to the phone, knowing full well that the agents that sat outside in the van would be listening, and called Sydney. What Irina didn’t expect however is that Sydney’s phone would be busy.
~ ~ ~
“Vaughn agreed,” Sydney said.
Jack was speechless after Sydney had told him, in short order that she and Vaughn were engaged, Sydney was pregnant, and, not only was Irina alive, but she was alive, living in Los Angeles, and professing to be a Christian. When she finally said that Vaughn agreed that Jack Bristow, Jr. could live with them after they found a house, he was too far beyond thought to form a coherent statement.
“Will that be okay?” she asked, hoping to get some sort of response. Jack just nodded numbly.
“Hold on a sec,” Sydney said when her phone rang. She answered. Sydney seemed to perk up even more when she found out who was on the other end of the line.
~ ~ ~
Thirty minutes earlier…
“Well, Jonah, or should I say Will, it seems that this is the end. I just got a call from the people at the Witness Protection Program, and it sounds like they have deemed the threat against you no longer apparent. They just told me to tell you that you can return to your old life.”
“I wish I could,” he said, “you know, return to my old life. That’ll never happen. But at least I can return and start a life somewhat similar to it,” he said excited. After clearing out his tools, he headed to his residence. He had noticed a long time ago that he never called it his home. To him, he realized, nothing would ever be home again. The news he had just received changed his mind on that. “I’m going home,” he thought. The first thing he did when he opened his door was go over to the phone. He dialed a number that he had been told not to unless he was in trouble.
He wasn’t in trouble, but he couldn’t wait to hear Sydney’s voice again. As soon as she picked up, Will said, “Sydney, guess what, I’m coming home.”
~ ~ ~
Danny looked around in amazement. He saw a black piece of paper with the CIA logo in one corner. Not knowing that it was another file that Jack had taken out of several other banks after Sydney discovered the one in Wittenberg, Danny just assumed that it meant what it looked like it meant. Jack was CIA. Now that he knew, he realized, he might very well be in danger. His last memory from Earth before he woke up in his casket was that of the man that had broken into his apartment forcing him into the bathroom at gunpoint. He even remembered the sound of the gunshot that ended his life the first time.
Having no desire to experience that again, he quickly grabbed the dirty clothes that he had been decomposing in for the past six years, tossed them in the washer, then the dryer, and when they were done, he left Jack’s house. With no idea where he was going, he walked along the street. He got a ride from a stranger to his sister’s apartment. He only hoped that she still lived there.
~ ~ ~
Suddenly being told by Carrie that her parents were moving in, Marshall quickly went around the house gathering up his odds and ends of gadgets. He couldn’t get the memory out of his mind of their last visit. The TV remote that doubled as stun gun hadn’t got the greatest review. He could still hear Carrie’s screaming, “What have you done? You knew she has a pacemaker, right?”
~ ~ ~
Walking into Dixon’s office, Sydney quickly got down to business. “Dixon, I thought I might as well inform you now that as soon as Vaughn and I get married, I’m going to leave. It’s not because I plan to rely solely on Vaughn as the provider for our family, it’s because I remember how I felt when Dad was gone all the time, and I don’t want our child to feel that way.”
“Why don’t you just take maternity leave?” Dixon asked, and then he realized what Sydney had just said, and he came around the desk to give her a hug. “Congratulations!” he exclaimed.
“Thanks, Dixon. I just wanted to let you know so that my resignation wouldn’t be as big of a shock.”
“So what do you plan to do after you deliver? I can’t see you just being a housewife.”
“Actually, I have a degree to become an English teacher. I figure I might as well use it.”
“That’s great. Can I ask you a personal question, actually more like a favor?”
“Sure.”
“Steven’s not doing so well in English. Do you think you could tutor him?”
“Sure.”
“Great. Now, even though I know it’s stating the obvious, I need to mention something to you about your wedding.
…TBC…
OMG!!!!!!!!!!! I loved it. I love having all the people back, b/c I hate when people die on Alias. I can't wait for the confrantation b/w Danny and Syd when she tells him she is in love with Vaughn. Please keep her with Vaughn, though. I can't wait to read more. Please let me know when you post more!!!!!!!!!!!
I posted a fan fic challenge on 2-23-05 in which I posted the first chapter of The Bioweapon and asked for someone to continue it by writing the next chapter. There have been no responses to it, so I thought I'd ask nicely, would someone please write the second chapter. I would love to see where else it could go.
Here's the link: Fan Fic Challenge. (The link is to a forum on SD-1 where I post more often. If you choose to do this, but don't have an account, I'm sorry.)
Now that that is out of the way, here is chapter 3. As I say each time, let me know what you think, and enjoy.
Chapter 3
Phase One
Will’s plane landed later that day. He was on a high as he waited for his luggage. Nothing could get him down, he thought. He didn’t realize how wrong he was until he realized that he knew the lady that was looking at the outgoing flights monitor. “She’s dead,” he thought.
Will didn’t want her to see him, so he grabbed his suitcase and was slipping out the door when he saw the man that he knew professed to love the woman he had just seen. His memories of his short interaction with this man made him even more convinced that he needed to get out of LAX, and fast.
~ ~ ~
Danny got out in front of the building that he last remembered his sister living in. He buzzed the room, praying that she would answer. His hopes were smashed when he heard a man answer. Though he had his answer right then, he hoped the man on the intercom would possibly know where his sister had moved. “Do you know a Lisa Hecht?” he asked, hoping that the guy wouldn’t leave the intercom before he got the answers he needed. “I haven’t been around for a while and the last address I have of hers is six years old.”
“I knew a Lisa Hecht,” the voice said, “but now, I know her as Lisa Anders.”
~ ~ ~
Francie woke that next morning fully rested. She didn’t have any clothes except for the ones that Sydney had given to her yesterday, so she put them on, and went down to find something to eat. The fridge was empty, and Francie was starving, so she went up into Jack’s room to look for money. She didn’t find anything, so she decided that she would have to go to Credit Dauphine and ask Sydney for some money. She didn’t like the fact that she was going to have to take advantage of her friendship in this way, but she didn’t see any other choices. She was walking to the bank when a man pulled over next to her.
“You need a ride?” he asked.
“Are you willing to give me one?”
“Sure,” the man said. “Get in.”
Francie complied.
“Where to?” he asked.
“Credit Dauphine,” Francie replied. The man’s expression changed.
“You do know that Credit Dauphine no longer exists, right?”
“No,” Francie said confused. “What happened?”
“No one really knows. All that’s known is that the CIA raided it and that the building was demolished a few months later. It’s been speculated that the reason the CIA raided it is because it was a location of a terrorist organization.”
Francie couldn’t believe her ears. “Syd was a terrorist!” she thought.
~ ~ ~
Later that day Sydney and Vaughn went looking at houses. The tenth one they walked in to elicited the same response from both. “This is it!” they said in unison. After contacting the Remax agent that was selling the house, Sydney and Vaughn went out to his car.
“I saw you talking with Dixon earlier today. What was that about?” Vaughn asked as he drove to the hospital to pick up Jack for lunch.
“I told him about my plans to leave when you and I get married.”
“How’d he take it?”
“Actually, he took it well. However, then we started discussing the wedding.”
“What about the wedding?”
“Dixon asked if I was planning on inviting Mom, Katya, and Yelena. Even though they all are terrorists, I still think that they should be allowed to take part in the wedding. Then he asked if you were going to invite Bill,” Sydney continued.
“And you told him ‘Yes,’ I presume,” Vaughn finished.
“Of course,” Sydney said.
“Well, since we’re on the topic of our guest list, I might as well bring this up. Do you mind if I invite my cousin?”
“Why would I mind?” Sydney asked not sure why Vaughn was asking that.
“If I invite Vince, we may have a media frenzy on our hands.”
“Wait,” Sydney said. “Vince Vaughn is your cousin?”
“Yeah,” Vaughn replied, “but we can’t let it get out too much. If anyone found out that his cousin was a CIA agent, my ability to go undercover ever again would be shot. Basically, we keep in touch by letters and E-mails. I haven’t actually seen him since before 2000.”
“Vaughn,” Sydney started to say, lightly massaging Vaughn’s tight neck muscles, “if you want to invite Vince, that’s fine. As for the media, I’m sure we can find ways around it. But, to change the topic, let’s get back to what Dixon said. He told me that in order to have our infamous relatives attend our wedding, we’ll have to agree to bring in metal detectors for everyone, not to mention the fact that we’ll need to have armed CIA agents escorting our relatives. Oh, and did I mention that, to be safe, Dixon suggested that all the members of the bridal party should wear bulletproof vests? Did I mention that if Yelena does show up for the wedding, as a matter of national security, she will be taken into custody? Vaughn, when Dixon mentioned all of this, I started to think about something so insane that, even though it's crazy, we’d be crazy not to do. Vaughn, after we eat with Dad, let’s get Weiss and Nadia and drive to Vegas. Vaughn, let’s elope! What do you say?”
~ ~ ~
Danny sat in the living room of his sister’s apartment. Lisa and Dave were just staring at him. Lisa broke the silence first. “So, Danny, why haven’t you called? Oh, that’s right, you were DEAD! How could you fake your…” she started. “Hey, there are certain things I fake once in a while, but I have NEVER faked my death!”
“You’ve faked with me?!” Dave asked, outraged.
“You’re not that gullible, are you?” Lisa asked bitterly.
“Listen, Lisa, I didn’t fake my…” Danny said, but was cut off by an angered Lisa.
“What was it? Cold feet?”
“I didn’t fake my…”
“Didn’t feel like getting married?”
“I didn’t fake my…”
“Oh, give it up! I must admit, though, you’re good. What was in that casket, barbells? Whatever it was, it was heavy enough to make me think that it was you. I see now why we had a closed casket ceremony.”
“Are you done with your incessant bickering?” Danny almost yelled. “I didn’t fake my death. A man came into my apartment and murdered me. Then yesterday, I wake up in my casket. I pounded and I screamed, and eventually used up my air supply. Everything went black, and then suddenly I was in this house I didn’t recognize. Sydney was there next to this weird sphere-shaped machine, and then she ran and hugged her father, and when I spoke up, she and I hugged. After that, Jack…”
“Jack who?”
“Jack Bristow agreed to let me stay with him. I went to his house last night, and when I got up this morning, I was looking around the house when I found some documents that had a CIA letterhead. Once I found that out, I left quickly.”
“Why? If he’s CIA, wouldn’t he protect you?” Dave said.
“You’d think,” Danny started, “but when Sydney told me that she was CIA, that’s what caused me to be targeted for ‘Termination,’” Danny said, doing his best Arnold Schwarzenegger impersonation.
“This isn’t funny!” Lisa snapped.
“Lisa, please! I’ve been dead for six years. I’ve moved on. The past is the past. I’m looking to the future.”
~ ~ ~
“Slow down, for goodness sakes,” Jack sniped. “There’s no contest.”
“We have a lot to do today,” Sydney said, looking at Vaughn with a smile.
“Like what?”
“Like finalizing our bid on that house, getting our stuff packed and ready to move, just a lot of things like that,” Vaughn said, covering for Sydney. He remembered making the call to the Montecito and booking a room for Mr. and Mrs. Vaughn. He was on such a high when he hung up. When Sydney and Vaughn both finished their meals, they drove Jack to his apartment to get his car, and they headed to Sydney’s apartment. While Sydney packed, Vaughn quickly called Dixon and told him that they wouldn’t be able to come in for the next two days. Sydney came out with her suitcase, and then Vaughn and Sydney quickly cornered Nadia and Weiss.
While they packed, Vaughn went to his house to pack. On his way back to Sydney’s apartment, he stopped at a jeweler and picked up the rings he had ordered. He hadn’t planned on getting them so early, but he was glad he was.
After throwing the suitcases in the trunk, Sydney, Vaughn, Nadia, and Weiss settled in for the four and a half hour trip that was going to change their lives.
~ ~ ~
Jack reluctantly headed to the CIA headquarters. He didn’t want to talk about what he had experienced after his death. However, after telling Dixon about his trouble sleeping, he had been ordered to see Barnett. It wasn’t that he didn’t like Barnett, he knew, but the idea of having someone poking around in his head didn’t leave him with a good feeling. He remembered when he had to pretend to get conned by that jerk that had taken Dixon during Sydney’s missing two years. He remembered Dixon telling him about how good Sawyer was, and warning Jack not to believe a word he said. He remembered those words when he met with Sawyer, but he was unnerved at how easily that man had maneuvered Jack right where he wanted him. The elevator door dinged and Jack stepped out.
~ ~ ~
Yelena picked up the phone. “Is everything going according to plans?”
The man on the other end of the line responded, “Yes, Phase One is completed. On to Phase Two.”
...TBC...
It may be out of character for Syd and Vaughn to elope, so if that strikes you as unlikely, I'm sorry. Also, next chapter has a slight crossover with Las Vegas. If you aren't familiar with the show, I'll try to post a small explanation that might help clear it up.
Hope you enjoy.
PS. I need a name for Sydney's kid. Please post a male name and a female name so that I don't have to give away the gender.
Preview of Chap 4
Chapter 4
The Getaway
Francie had the man drop her off in front of Will’s apartment. She rang the doorbell and apologized profusely when a woman in a towel answered the door. She heard a car pull into the driveway, and then she heard Will’s voice. “Francie?” he asked, sounding shocked. She turned to see him. Her face lit up when she saw his face, but her expression soon changed when Will pulled a gun on her.
Okay, here it is. Like I said, this one has a slight crossover with Las Vegas in it. The main characters are:
Ed Deline - Head of the Montecito's Surveilance and Security area. Formerly CIA.
Delinda Deline - Ed's Daughter, manager of a hot club called Mystique.
Jillian Deline - Ed's wife
Samantha Jane Marquez (SP) (AKA Sam) A casino host.
Vanessa (AKA Nessa) - A pit boss (card dealer), moved in with Delines after her dad died on a mission with Ed.
Let me know what you think. If you don't like the crossover, let me know. I tried to dial it down. Enjoy!
Chapter 4
The Getaway
Francie had the man drop her off in front of Will’s apartment. She rang the doorbell and apologized profusely when a woman in a towel answered the door. She heard a car pull into the driveway, and then she heard Will’s voice. “Francie?” he asked, sounding shocked. She turned to see him. Her face lit up when she saw his face, but her expression soon changed when Will pulled a gun on her.
~ ~ ~
Sam walked up to Vaughn and Sydney. “Hi, welcome to the Montecito. I’m your casino host for your stay. You can call me Sam.”
“We didn’t ask for a casino host,” Vaughn said, curious as to what was going on.
“Actually, Ed, my boss, asked me to do this.”
“Ed who?”
“Hold on a sec,” Sam said, opening her phone, “Ed wants to see you two.”
As Sam led them to Ed’s office, she wondered from where Ed knew Vaughn. She could only guess it was from his days with the CIA.
~ ~ ~
“Uncle Ed!” Vaughn said smiling when he saw Ed Deline standing in front of the wall of monitors.
“Mikey boy,” Ed replied as they shook hands.
“Hey, Ed, this is Sydney Bristow, my fiancée. Sydney, Ed. Ed, Sydney. Ed used to work with my father.”
“Oh, okay,” Sydney said. She had been wondering how they knew each other.
“So, Ed, how’s Delinda?”
“She’s fine. She’s actually working at Mystique down on the main floor. She’ll be glad to see you.”
“Good.”
“Nice to meet you Mr. Ed,” Sydney said.
“I’m assuming that’s not in reference to the horse,” Ed said raising an eyebrow.
“No. I haven’t caught your last name, though.”
“My last name’s Deline,” Ed said, as Sydney and Vaughn left.
~ ~ ~
“Jack?” Dixon started. “Could you have Danny and Francie call me later today?”
“Just stop by my house later today and I’ll let you talk to them then. What do you need to say?”
“Diane and I are throwing Sydney an appreciation dinner, and I thought it’d be good to have everyone that she resurrected be there. Do you think they can make it?”
“I doubt they have anything else to do. Why don’t we just go now. I’m sure they’re hungry.”
“Okay,” Dixon said. Jack and Dixon both went to their vehicles and drove to Jack’s house, only to find it empty.
~ ~ ~
“WILL?! What the fu**? Put that gun down now!”
“If you are Francie, then what was that term we found in Boggle that meant a blockhead?”
“What?”
The gun was still pointed at her head. “The word! What was the word?”
“I don’t remember!” She yelled back. “It was like ‘mumps’ or something like that.”
“Numps,” Will said as he lowered his gun. “It was numps. Amy had it, too.” Will proceeded to break into tears. “It’s really you,” he said, and then, looking at her, he realized how much he missed her. They started to kiss.
Francie remembered when they had done that last. It had been just a short time before that b***h had shot her. That b***h had looked just like her. She broke the kiss and spoke. “Will, did you and that woman that…” She trailed off.
“That double of you and I, did we what?” he asked, wondering just what she was trying to get at.
“That double, did you and her ever, you know, consummate our relationship?”
Will looked down, ashamed. “Yes; we did it on several occasions. In my defense, though, I thought she was you.”
“How touching. So how did you know I was here?”
“I didn’t. I just wanted to see my old apartment before I went to meet with Sydney. Now excuse me for being blunt, but why aren’t you dead?”
“Sydney used some machine and suddenly I was back. I don’t know what’s going on, but things sure are weird. Will, did you know that Sydney was a terrorist?”
“Actually, she wasn’t a terrorist. She was a double agent."
"Wait!" Francie nearly yelled. "She was a what?"
"Let's ask her when we see her," Will said, changing the topic. Francie looked at Will again, and they kissed once more.
~ ~ ~
"What should we do?" Dixon asked. "We want them there for the meal."
"Put out an APB on them and have them brought in."
"Don't you think that's excessive?"
"They know the location of one of our safe houses, not to mention that they aren't acclimated to the current times. I'm sure that Diane seems a little behind."
"She is, but...” Dixon trailed off. “But an APB,” Dixon said, “Isn’t that a little…” he searched for the right word, “excessive?”
“What do you want to do? Do you want to wait for them to come to us? They probably want to see old family and friends and tell them about what happened. Who knows what intel they might reveal. Sydney mentioned to me once that Danny had a brother and a sister. The brother died when he was young, but the sister, to the best of my knowledge, is still alive. My guess is that Danny is there. As for Francie, she probably went to see what’s left of her old life. I’d suggest starting at her old restaurant.”
“I’ll get on it,” Dixon said, and left to check the database for any next-of-kin for Daniel Hecht.
~ ~ ~
“Delinda?” Vaughn asked as he approached Mystique.
“Michael?” Delinda asked, shocked.
“How’s it going with you?”
“Great,” she said, and then turned to the next people in line. “Do you have reservations?”
“Abrams,” the man replied. Delinda checked and let him in.
“What brings you here to Vegas?”
“Marriage,” Vaughn said bluntly.
“Oh! Congradulations!”
“Delinda Deline, this is Sydney Bristow. Sydney Bristow, this is Delinda Deline.”
“Nice to meet you,” they both said as they shook hands. “Can we continue this conversation later? I’ve got a lot of hungry customers here, and I…”
“That’s fine,” Vaughn said cutting her off. “One last question, though. Where’s a good place to get married?”
“Ask Sam,” Delinda said and turned back to the customers.
“See you later, then,” Vaughn said, as they turned around to leave.
“I get off at eleven. Meet back here. I’ll have Günter cook up something special.”
“Okay. Will Ed, Julian, or Nessa be able to make it?”
“I’ll check. It’s good to see you again.”
“You too.”
Sydney and Vaughn walked away to find Sam and change their lives forever.
~ ~ ~
Sloane and Emily relaxed watching the in-flight movie. “What is it?” Emily asked, noticing Sloane’s glances at her.
“I never realized just how beautiful you are,” he said smiling.
“You know,” she started, “I’ve always wanted to enter an elusive club,” she said. “Let’s not miss our chance now,” Emily smiled. “Have you ever heard of the mile-high club?”
~ ~ ~
The conversation had been tense at Lisa’s house, but when Danny finished telling his story, Lisa and Dave both were convinced that he was telling the truth. “Can I get you something else to drink?” Lisa asked getting up.
“Water’s fine,” Danny said, then jumped to his feet as the door fell in and five agents trained their guns on him.
“Come with us,” they said, and escorted Danny out of the building.
~ ~ ~
Francie looked around at her old restaurant. She laughed when she noticed that the walls had been painted white. “I remember when Jack told me to use red. He said that white in some cultures meant…” She trailed off as a man sat next to her, holding a gun in her ribs.
“Come with me, Miss Calfo.”
~ ~ ~
As Weiss and Nadia watched, the preacher said, “I now pronounce you man and wife. You may kiss the bride.” Vaughn obeyed. Later on, when throwing the bouquet, Weiss blushed when Nadia caught it.
“I guess we’re next, honey,” she said, playfully nudging him in the ribs. Nadia, Weiss, and Mr. and Mrs. Vaughn all got into the limo. The whole meal at Mystique, Sydney and Vaughn couldn’t quit smiling.
…TBC…
Chapter 5
The Confession
Nadia watched as her father walked up to the table and placed a bottle of champagne on the table. They sat down and Sloane turned to Emily and said, “Emily, I’d like you to meet Nadia. Nadia, I’d like you to meet Emily.”
Nadia heard Emily ask her how she knew Sloane, only to see Sloane grimace. “I work with him,” she said, not wanting to rock the boat. Nadia saw Sloane relax and felt good.
When Sydney and Vaughn both got back to their new house, they had to change quickly. The meal with the Dixon’s was a few hours away and they had to make sure they were ready. They got into the shower and cleaned each other, and then got out and opened the dresser, one of the few pieces of furniture they had managed to move in already. Sydney found a fancy red dress, the ruby earrings Vaughn had given her for her birthday and a pair of red high heels. Vaughn got into his traditional suit and tie, and they both looked into each other’s eyes and smiled.
“I’m the luckiest man in the world,” Vaughn said as he brushed Sydney’s hair behind her ears. “What did I ever do to deserve you?”
“You were there whenever I needed you. You were the one constant in my life.”
“Thanks,” Vaughn said, and then looked around. “You know what this place needs?”
“A baby room?”
“Well, yeah, but I was thinking of something else.”
“What?”
“In college, I was the biggest fan of pool. I played it whenever I could. I swore, when I bought my first house, a pool table would be one of the first things I would buy after the house. When I told Lauren that, she told me it was a waste of money. How could I have been so stupid as to…” he trailed off. “The past is the past. Let’s just leave it there.”
~ ~ ~
“J. J’s Billiards,” the voice on the other end of the line said.
“Hello,” Jack said, as he pulsed the bugs that he had planted. “I’d like to order a pool table,” he continued, knowing that he was going to give Sydney and Vaughn the greatest wedding present ever.
~ ~ ~
All of Sydney’s friends and family were gathered waiting for Sydney to arrive. Francie and Danny were both dressed up, having used some of the money that Noah had given to them to buy a small wardrobe. Sydney walked in and they all yelled, “Surprise!”
~ ~ ~
Sydney was standing in the doorway in shock, staring at all her friends. A waiter pulled out a chair. “Right here, Miss Bristow,” he said.
“Mrs. Vaughn,” she said, and then turned to see everyone staring at her. She held up her hand, showing the ring. She knew that it would take a while for it to sink in for everyone but Jack, Nadia, and Weiss. She noticed that Jack didn’t seem surprised at all. She was confused at that, considering that she hadn’t told him that she had eloped yet.
Francie got up. She came around the table and looked at the ring. “Congratulations!” she exclaimed. Sydney smiled. She looked around the table. She felt a twinge of sorrow when she saw Danny’s face. He looked hurt, but when he saw that she was looking at him, he flashed a smile.
The hubbub had finally died down when Sloane and Emily came in. Sydney didn’t know how to feel. She was glad to see Emily, but knowing that Sloane was there almost dampened her mood. She noticed that he had something in his hand.
~ ~ ~
As Emily and Sloane walked toward Sydney, Sloane muttered quietly, “I hope she’ll take it.” He held up the bottle of champagne and then proceeded to smile. “Hello, Sydney.”
~ ~ ~
Nadia watched as her father walked up to the table and placed a bottle of champagne on the table. They sat down and Sloane turned to Emily and said, “Emily, I’d like you to meet Nadia. Nadia, I’d like you to meet Emily.”
Nadia heard Emily ask her how she knew Sloane, only to see Sloane grimace. “I work with him,” she said, not wanting to rock the boat. Nadia saw Sloane relax and felt good.
~ ~ ~
Meagan came last of all. She had been monitoring a phone call of a man that would not shut up. When he finally said his farewells, no new intel had been gathered and Meagan had to hurry to get ready. When she got there, the only free spot was next to the man that Sydney had said was her old fiancé. She sat next to him, and Sydney introduced them. “Danny. That’s his name,” she thought.
~ ~ ~
Sydney enjoyed the meal, and when everybody said goodnight, Sydney realized just how fortunate she was to have so many close friends. Danny told Jack that he needed to make a quick stop before they went to his house, and Meagan volunteered to take him. Danny got into Meagan’s car and they went to Lisa’s house real quick.
Danny gave Lisa Jack’s address, and then told Meagan that he was done.
“So you and Syd were engaged, right?” Meagan asked as they drove.
“Yeah.”
“And then she told you she worked for the CIA, and some guy broke in and shot you?”
“Yeah.”
“And then, suddenly, you wake up in a room six years later and the love of your life is engaged to someone else?”
“Yeah.”
“That has seriously got to stink.”
“It does,” Danny started, “but I have memories from the afterlife, so I was aware some time had passed, but I was amazed when I found out it had been six years.”
“So what are you going to do now?”
“Look for a job and an apartment. That guy that was there tonight, Noah I think it was, had a large amount of money stored away, so he gave Francie and I one million dollars each, which I plan to make full use of.”
“What do you think will happen with you and Sydney?”
“I don’t know,” Danny said. “I honestly don’t know.”
~ ~ ~
Sydney and Vaughn wanted to christen their new house, but Sydney got a phone call before anything happened. “Syd?” she heard Will say, “Could you come over here and tell Francie what exactly is going on with your life?”
“What do you mean?”
“She wants to know about how you helped take down SD-6, your job with the CIA, and, most importantly, what happened to Allison.” Sydney heard Francie say something. “Allison was the person who shot you.” Will returned to talking into the phone. “Just get over here quickly.”
Sydney drove to Jack’s house, and proceeded to tell Francie the whole story. When she got to telling Francie about Allison, Francie tightened up. “I want her dead!” Francie said suddenly.
“She is. Don’t worry,” Will told her.
“Actually, Will,” Sydney started, “when I activated the Sphere of Life, she was resurrected as well.”
“Sydney,” Francie said, “You are going to teach me what you know. If she ever comes after me again, I want to be ready.”
“Fair enough,” Sydney replied, and then finished the story. Both Will and Francie were stunned beyond words when Sydney had told them that she worked for Sloane again. Before they could say anything, however, Sydney suddenly blindsided Francie with a blunt question. “Can you explain this?” she asked holding up the sleeping pills.
“None of us could sleep the first night, so we all went out and got some. Wait a minute. It was you who took those. I couldn’t get to sleep last night because of you.”
“You need to learn to fall asleep without these,” Sydney said.
“Easy for you to say! You don’t know what I went through after I died. If you did, I don’t think even you could fall asleep without help.” Francie grabbed the pills and put them in the kitchen. She returned with a large knife. “First lesson,” she said, “Throwing knives. Let’s start with something I know a little about.”
Sydney got Jack’s permission to use some of his old clothing to make a rudimentary dummy, and then proceeded to go into the backyard, posted the dummy, took the knife, and threw it. Francie, Will, and Sydney all went over to it to see where the knife had hit. “Good aim,” Francie said as Sydney pulled the knife out of the area a typical person’s heart would have been.
Sydney gave Francie several pointers and left both Francie and Will to practice well into the night by the light from the back porch. When Sydney got home, she and Vaughn finally had time to themselves. Time they used to the fullest advantage.
~ ~ ~
Irina sat in the living room, watching TV. She remembered the time she had managed to change the channel by saying it, a trend she had started to notice she was able to harness more and more. She looked down at the anklet. “Off,” she said, and the lights suddenly went dark.
~ ~ ~
“Arvin,” Emily said as they lay together in their bed.
“Hmm?” Sloane mumbled.
“Earlier today, you introduced me to that Nadia person. When I asked how you two knew each other, I felt you tense up. What didn’t she tell me? Tell me the truth or I’ll leave right now.”
“Emily, you know I love you, right? You know that I’d never do anything to intentionally harm you, right?” Sloane started. “What I’m about to tell you, however, is going to hurt. Emily, Nadia is my daughter.”
I can't wait to see how Emily reacts about Nadia. I hope she is nice to her, because Emily doesn't strike me as a mean person. I can't wait to read more.
The knife hit the area that Sydney pointed out as being the heart on the dummy.
“Great throw!” Will said incredulously.
“Thanks,” Francie said, pulling the knife out and throwing it again. The knife hit the target where it was supposed to, again. Francie went back inside, leaving Will there to practice. As Francie walked by the kitchen, she saw the sleeping pills out again. She tensed up. “I can’t,” she thought, and took a few steps. It was then that the memories of those nightmares that kept her up each night flooded her thoughts. “I won’t take them,” she said out loud, trying to convince herself.
Francie managed to get up five stairs, before turning around, walking into the kitchen and grabbing some pills. She filled one of the few glasses that Jack had got out and swallowed the pills. She felt her body relax a little. A short while later, Francie was sleeping peacefully.
~ ~ ~
Danny heard Francie in the basement, and wondered what she had been doing that was keeping her up so late. He walked down the stairs. He saw an empty glass by the sink. As he put it in the dishwasher, he heard a thud and a few branches breaking. As he stepped out the back door, he saw Will pulling a knife out of what looked like a human. Closing the door quietly, he turned the deadbolt and then checked that all the other doors were locked.
~ ~ ~
“Your daughter?” Emily asked.
“Yes,” Sloane responded.
“With whom?”
“Irina Derevko.”
“You said you had stopped seeing her. We went to counseling. Did that not mean anything to you?”
“Emily, this is all in the past. It’s insignificant now.”
“Actually, it’s very significant. I can’t stay with you, with your lies. How could you keep this from me for all this time?”
“I didn’t even know until after you died.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Arvin, I want you to tell me the truth now. About everything. If I ever find out that you’ve lied to me about anything else after this, we’re over.”
“Emily, are you sure about this?”
“Yes.”
“Okay,” Sloane said, and proceeded to tell Emily the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
~ ~ ~
“On,” Irina said, and watched as the light on her anklet came back on. “This could come in handy,” she thought.
~ ~ ~
“Mr. Jurgens, nice to talk to you again.”
“Who is this?”
“You don’t recognize my voice? It’s me, Dr. Markovich. I have a business proposal for you.”
~ ~ ~
After finally perfecting throwing the knife, Will went up to the door to go in, but he discovered that it was locked. Not wanting to wake anyone up, he went over to his car and grabbed his lock pick. Working on the lock took a while, but eventually he got it. “Thank you, witness protection,” he thought, slipping into the house.
~ ~ ~
Danny couldn’t sleep. He wanted to call Sydney. It was too late, however. “Meagan had said that she was going to be up late, hadn’t she,” he thought. “She had,” he realized. Going downstairs, he found her name in the phone book and dialed her number.
~ ~ ~
“Pro…” the words were fading out for Meagan as she tried to make sense of this dream. “Pro…Chris…success…” In her mind, she went back once more. “Project Christmas is a success.” That was her dad’s voice, she realized suddenly. “What the he** is Project Christmas?” She mused out loud. Then her phone rang. “Hello? Oh, hi Danny. No, I’m not busy. Meet somewhere? Sure.” They set up the time and place. Meagan smiled. Ever since she had first laid eyes on Danny, she felt attracted to him. “Who cares what Project Christmas is,” she thought, “Danny wants to meet me somewhere.”
Meagan proceeded to find some nice clothes and then drove over to the park. She was sitting on the bench when Danny came over to her.
~ ~ ~
The next morning, Noah went to a local sporting goods store. Walking to the back, he picked out a gun, paid for it, and filled out the paperwork to get it licensed to him. He had unfinished business. “And this time,” Noah thought, “I’m not going to settle for a wimpy ice pick.”
~ ~ ~
Danny woke up in an unfamiliar location. It took him a while to pinpoint what had happened last night. He had seen Will pull the knife out of that dummy. He was grateful that he had found out it was just a dummy before he left. Then he had agreed to meet Meagan in the park. “We talked for a while, and then we, we…” Danny couldn’t remember. Seeing Meagan coming into the room with a tray of food made it all come back. He had asked to stay at her place, seeing as he had already had a gun pointed at his head, been arrested for talking to his sister, and seeing his fiancée, ex-fiancee’s best friend appear to be stabbing someone, ever since he had started staying at Jack’s house.
~ ~ ~
That morning, the pool table was delivered to Sydney and Michael Vaughn’s new house. They set it up in the basement, and they agreed to play each other when they got back from APO.
Over the next few months…
Sydney and Vaughn got even closer. Noah managed to finish the other hit he’d been hired to do before he died. Meagan and Danny went from a friendship to a dating relationship. Nadia and Emily bonded. Jack quit APO in order to raise Jack Jr. Sydney continued to teach Will, Francie, and Danny self defense, classes that ranged from knife-throwing to marksmanship and she even touched on explosives. Irina lived in peace at her house. Sloane once again was in control of APO.
“What is it?” Vaughn asked, noticing Sydney wincing in pain.
“We need to get to the hospital. NOW!” Sydney said emphatically. Vaughn carried her out to their car and drove somewhat recklessly to the hospital. When they got there, Sydney was put in a private room. While the labor pains grew more intense, Sloane contacted the powers-that-be and arranged for Irina and Bill to be there for the birth of their grandchildren.
Each time Vaughn saw Sydney go through another contraction, he felt bad for her. He never liked seeing her in pain. Vaughn had to laugh, however, when Sydney told the nurse to give her the drugs, even after seeing the needle. The doctor was smiling when he pulled the baby from her. “It’s a boy,” the doctor said, and then Vaughn clipped the umbilical cord. A nurse took the baby in a clean towel and cleaned it off as well as she could.
“Get ready,” the doctor said, “Here comes number two.”
The next baby was a girl, and Vaughn looked at Sydney laying there in the bed, her hair dripping with sweat. “You did it. Congratulations, Mom.”
“Congratulations, Dad,” Sydney said in return.
When they went out into the waiting room to deliver the news, Jack, Irina, Bill, and Jessica Vaughn all stood. Sydney noticed that Bill was doing well on his prosthetic leg. “It’s a boy and a girl,” Sydney said smiling. The hugs that followed were long and tight and full of congratulations.
“I have more news,” Sydney said. “Janet Erickson High School just accepted my application. I start in a month.”
…TBC…
Sorry about skipping over the time of pregnancy and all that happened, but I had to advance the story timeline. Might go back and add more on later, but as for now, that's how it is. And about the name, you now see why I asked for a boy's name and a girl's name. I can use Kim for the girl, so I still need a boy's name.
Ch. 7 spoiler
Francie was at the firing range. She loaded the magazine, put on the ear protectors and eye protectors, loaded a bullet in the chamber, and proceeded to empty the entire round. “Very nice grouping,” she heard Will say. She turned around and they kissed. Francie pressed the button that brought the target forward. When Will took it off, he stared at the fifteen closely spaced holes in the head area. “Remind me to never piss you off,” he said, and then took the gun he had just checked out and proceeded to put all the holes through the heart area.
Sydney started at the school full of hopes. She found out soon that things were not as they always had seemed they would be to her. She had envisioned a class that was nice and calm. What she discovered was that being a teacher was also like being a peacemaker. Over the next three years, however, she managed to figure out the small things that were necessary in doing the job, and then it wasn’t as bad.
Sydney was finishing up her lecture the day before spring break began when she saw Vaughn standing outside her doorway. Finishing up quickly, she dismissed the children at the bell and, after talking to a few kids privately, she let him in.
“Hey, honey,” she said, smiling at him.
“Hey.” Vaughn said with no emotion apparent in his voice.
“What is it?”
“This isn’t a personal visit. We need you back at APO for something real quick.”
~ ~ ~
Marshall was working on his latest invention when he saw Sydney coming in. Setting down the lock-pick that he had disguised into looking like a comb, he went out to meet her. Several people crowded around her, but Marshall managed to get through. “Hey, Marshall!” she exclaimed.
“Hi, Sydney, I’m glad Vaughn was able to convince you to return.”
“So, what is so urgent that you need my help?”
Sloane stepped out of his office. “Meeting. NOW!”
~ ~ ~
Sloane was in the front of the room looking out at the faces before him. Clicking the mouse, a picture came up on the screens behind him. “This is Leek Choy, also known as John Lincoln.” Everyone studied the picture. “Three days ago, Echelon picked up a message between him and your aunt, Sydney, Yelena.”
“What did the message say?”
Sloane played the message.
Yelena: Are things almost ready?
Leek: Yes. Everything is in place. We are awaiting your instructions.
Yelena: When I have conformation I will call you back. Be ready.
Suddenly there was the dial tone emanating from the speakers. Sloane ended the audio file. “Obviously, something big is about to happen. We don’t know what, though.”
“I still don’t get how this is my problem.”
The picture changed. A young girl playing volleyball was now what Sydney saw. “Lucy,” she said quietly.
“Lucy Lincoln,” Sloane said, “Daughter of John and Jenny Lincoln. I believe you’re familiar with where she goes to school?”
“Janet Erickson High School,” Sydney said quietly. “She’s one of my best students.”
“We don’t have a way into their house to plant bugs other than the obvious idea of a door-to-door salesman. When we discovered their daughter went to your school, we realized that you would have an excuse to go to their house. What I want to know is this: are you willing to help?”
~ ~ ~
John was typing at the computer. Activating the satellite hidden function, he set the timer. Twenty-four hours changed into twenty-three hours, fifty-nine minutes, and fifty-nine seconds. The countdown continued. The plans were in motion.
~ ~ ~
Marshall stood in front of the group. Picking up a box, he handed it to Sydney. She opened it, revealing a pen, or so it seemed. “Okay, that box that you have contains my newest creation, and it’s a doozy, alright?”
“What’s it do?”
“Well, first off, as Sloane mentioned before, we need to bug their house. You know, bug as in listening device not…you know what I mean. Of course you do, you’ve only been gone, what, three and a half years? Okay, I just thought I…never mind. Do you remember that tube of lipstick I gave you back at SD-6 that had the cameras in it with the compressed air behind it to shoot the camera out? Good. This is a lot like that, only, and this is really cool, the camera is twenty times smaller.”
Marshall took a white piece of paper, aimed the pen, and triggered the air to shoot out the camera. When he showed the paper to Sydney, she didn’t even see the mark it had made. “It’s almost completely undetectable to the human eye. Plus, and this I’m really proud of, it can’t be detected by bug detectors or taken out by bug killers. IT’S IMMORTAL!” Marshall said, imitating the people in Godzilla with fake fear. “But that’s just the bug aspect of it. It also has this handy dandy wireless modem built into it. If you can get close to his computer with it, we can upload the data from here. This baby’s so loaded the only thing it can’t do is write. I would have done that, but, well, you understand, there was no room for the ink cartridge.”
Sydney took the pen and looked at it amazed. “I’ll do it, she said.”
~ ~ ~
The countdown continued: 23 hours, 47 minutes, 56 seconds.
~ ~ ~
Francie was at the firing range. She loaded the magazine, put on the ear protectors and eye protectors, loaded a bullet in the chamber, and proceeded to empty the entire round. “Very nice grouping,” she heard Will say. She turned around and they kissed. Francie pressed the button that brought the target forward. When Will took it off, he stared at the fifteen closely spaced holes in the head area. “Remind me to never piss you off,” he said, and then took the gun he had just checked out and proceeded to put all the holes through the heart area.
~ ~ ~
Meagan was still looking on the CIA database for Project Christmas. She hadn’t found anything in the past three years, but she was determined. Sydney walked by, saw what she was searching for, and asked, “Why are you searching for Project Christmas?”
“Do you know what it is?”
“Yeah, my father used me as a guinea pig for it.”
“What is it?” Meagan asked. Sydney explained. Meagan stared at Sydney in disbelief as she described all she had found out about it. Realizing that they were both along for this ride because of their fathers’ decisions, they could feel an even tighter bond forming.
~ ~ ~
“Lincolns’,” John said as he picked up the phone.
“Mr. Lincoln, it’s Sydney Vaughn, Lucy’s English teacher. I have something I’d like to discuss with you. Are you free?”
“Yeah, sure. Do you want to come over now?”
“Do you mind?”
“No, not at all. Do you need our address?”
“No, Lucy filled out an information sheet that has it. I’ll be there in about twenty minutes. Is that okay?”
“Fine. See you then.” John hung up, went over to the computer and hid the countdown that was at 22 hours, 34 minutes, 10 seconds.
~ ~ ~
Marshall looked at the screen when an alarm came up. The facial recognization software had just picked up a familiar face. The screen showed pictures of known terrorists flashing by. It stopped on a composite. The composite was the one that Sydney gave them when she had killed Lauren. Once she had activated the Sphere of Life, the picture was added. Marshall saw the location of the camera that had taken the picture. It was right there in Los Angeles.
~ ~ ~
Vaughn saw the alert, and when he found out who it was, he picked up the phone. “Hello. It’s Michael Vaughn. We need to meet. I have a job for you. I’m not going to tell you about it over the phone.” They set up a time and a place, and Vaughn went to the storage area. Grabbing two items, he headed off to meet the man he had just talked to.
~ ~ ~
“Well, Mr. Lincoln, I just thought I’d come over here in person and tell you that, with as well as your daughter is doing in class, it’s my professional opinion that she should take an IQ test. I honestly believe she could skip a few grades. I’ve got some files online. Would you mind if I used your computer to show them to you?”
“Not at all,” John said, and led Sydney to the room with his computer. When she was by the CPU, Sydney “accidentally” dropped her pen.
~ ~ ~
“She’s transmitting,” Marshall said, as he downloaded the files to the computer.
~ ~ ~
“These are some of Lucy’s writings. They are so advanced that I honestly believe she belongs in the tenth grade English class, instead of stuck in the eighth grade class.”
~ ~ ~
“Download complete,” Marshall said through the coms.
~ ~ ~
Sydney brushed the hair behind her ear in order to tap on the earring communicator. Making it only seem like she was shifting her weight, Sydney grabbed the pen and fired some more bugs. As John was showing Sydney her way out, the pen slipped again, and when Sydney reached down to pick it up, feedback came from the speaker that was right by her earring. When she stood up, John had a gun trained on her.
“Stay right where you are,” he said. Sydney knew he was far enough away that she wouldn’t be able to disarm him safely. She slowly stood up with her hands up, hoping, desperately hoping that he’d come near to get her where he wanted her.
John pulled the trigger.
~ ~ ~
“Thanks for meeting with me,” Vaughn said, looking at the man before him.
“No problem,” Noah replied, eyeing Vaughn. “What is this about?”
“I have a job for you,” Vaughn said, and proceeded to tell Noah what he wanted done.
~ ~ ~
The countdown continued as John dragged Sydney’s body into his basement. The clock changed from 22 hours left to 21 hours, 59 minutes, and 59 seconds left.
The clock ticked on.
...TBC...
Please let me know what you think.
McKenas Cole picked up the phone. “How are things going?”
Sydney is DEAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And I am surprised that Danny isn't more upset that the woman he loves is married to someone else. I mean, isn't he kind of in the same situation as Syd was in, in Season 3? I am glad he has found someone, though.
Haven't updated for a while. Here is through ch. 11
Please let me know what you think. I love getting feedback.
Chapter 8
The Nemesis
“What are we doing about this?” Vaughn said as he stormed into Sloane’s office. “It’s been three hours and we haven’t heard from Sydney!”
“Mrs. Vaughn is not an official agent anymore. When I contacted Agent Chase to inform her of the situation, she told me that, because of this fact, we cannot spare agents in the search for a civilian. She told me that we need to have all our agents focused on the problem at hand: the impending terrorist attack.”
“I can’t even think of concentrating on the attack not knowing the fate of my wife,” Vaughn snipped.
“I was ordered to coordinate this task force to the prevention of the attack. I suppose that finding and capturing Mr. Lincoln would fit in that category,” Sloane said, looking around. He turned to his computer and opened a Word file. Vaughn looked at him confused. Sloane turned the monitor. The screen showed some simple sentences.
Contact Jack. He’d be willing to help.
Vaughn nodded and walked out of the building. He drove to Jack’s house and explained the situation. Jack agreed to help.
Back at APO, Sloane watched the video the bug had recorded of John shooting Sydney, pulling her into the basement, and then returning later with something Sloane could only surmise as being Sydney wrapped in a tarp, slung over John’s shoulder as he headed out to the car.
~ ~ ~
Officer Dilbert Fox watched the rest of the team as they surrounded the restaurant. He nodded and the stormed into it. Lauren quickly got up and started to run. They opened fire, but unfortunately no one managed to hit her. The last they saw of her was her dyed brunette hair exiting a door being held open for her.
~ ~ ~
“Thank you,” Lauren managed to get out through her deep breaths.
“No problem,” Noah said, smiling. “You’re Lauren Reed, right?” he asked, and
watched as she nodded. “You’re lucky to be alive. The cops are after you and your husband just hired me to take you out.”
“What?”
“Vaughn hired me to kill you. I guess he doesn’t know where my real loyalties lie.”
~ ~ ~
Marshall cursed as the screen flashed “Access Denied.”
“What is it?” Sloane asked coming up behind him.
“I can’t hack the files. I don’t know how they managed to protect them so well, but I’ve tried all the tricks in the book and none of them work.”
~ ~ ~
Irina was watching Jeopardy when she felt a headache coming on. Going to the kitchen, she took some pain relievers and went back to the show. The pain relievers didn’t work, however, and suddenly, the lights went out and the TV turned off.
“Must be a blackout,” she thought. She changed her mind when a fluorescent light in the kitchen exploded.
~ ~ ~
Jack agreed to help Vaughn as soon as he found a babysitter. Vaughn told Jack that they could let Danny watch Jack, Jr. Jack agreed.
~ ~ ~
Danny stared at the two kids playing in front of him, overwhelmed. He heard a crash in the kitchen. Running in there quickly, he found Kim sitting in the middle of a mess. While he was taking her to the bathroom to clean her off, he didn’t see Ben manage to open the front door and get out.
~ ~ ~
Dixon stared at the footage from the traffic cameras and all the other cameras, hoping to find where John had gone. The trail went cold, however quite early. “She’s on her own,” he sadly thought.
~ ~ ~
McKenas Cole picked up the phone. “How are things going?”
“I’ve run into a problem,” he heard John say.
“Just how big of a problem are we talking?”
“About 5’8”.”
“Can you take care of it?”
“I plan to bury this problem.”
“Good. We can’t let anything stand in our way.”
~ ~ ~
Bill looked at Victor. “Guess what?”
Victor was silent.
“Victor, I’ve got good news for you.”
Silence
“Victor George Arbor, I am talking to you!”
“You’re not my dad,” Victor said quietly.
“Vick, I’ve got good news.”
“Don’t call me Vick!” Victor spat out.
“You’re going to meet you’re mother soon,” Bill said, hoping that it would perk his son up a little.
“Yelena is not my mom. You are not my dad. You betrayed me. You betrayed
this country. I am not your son.”
“Victor, I’m sorry.”
“Shove your sorry up your @$$,” Victor spat.
Scooting up closer, Bill put his arm around Victor’s shoulders.
Victor spun and pulled Bill’s arm out of its socket. He smiled when he heard the pop. Walking to the other side of the cell, he sat down in silence again.
~ ~ ~
Danny came back down the stairs. “Hey, Kim,” he said smiling. His smile quickly vanished when he realized that Ben was gone. Calling Lisa and giving her the address, he quickly looked around the outside of the house with no luck. Lisa pulled up a few minutes later, and after she agreed to watch the kids, Danny got into his car and drove around the block, looking hard for Ben. When he felt his car hit something, he slammed on the brakes.
~ ~ ~
The countdown changed. There was less than seventeen hours to go. John looked up into the starry sky waiting for the call from Yelena. His phone rang. Looking at the display, he noticed that it was Jenny.
~ ~ ~
“Honey, what happened today?”
“What are you talking about?”
“I just got home. The floor in the living room is covered in blood.”
John thought quickly. “There was a car crash outside our house today. The man who came to our door had been cut by some flying glass. He waited in the living room while I called the cops.”
“Oh, I thought something died in there for a while.”
“Nope. Sorry,” John said laughing.
“Well if that’s the case, I guess that’s okay. Hey, you’ll never guess who I saw today.”
“Who?”
“Will Tippin.”
“THE Will Tippin? Your old boyfriend?”
“Yeah.”
“Listen, Honey, I’d love to chat, but I’m expecting a very important phone call.”
“Okay. Bye.”
“Bye.”
~ ~ ~
Marshall ran into Sloane’s office. “We got him. We managed to get John, um, I mean Mr. Lincoln’s location. I triangulated his location when he just used his phone.”
“That’s good. How’s it going with the hacking.”
“I can’t get it. I was just wondering, though, where’s Vaughn? I was going to give him the coordinates.”
“Call his cell phone and give them to him.”
Marshall’s beeper went off. “Mr. Lincoln’s on the phone again.”
~ ~ ~
“Are you ready for my part?” Yelena asked.
“Yes,” John said. “So how’s your husband?”
“I’ll know in a little bit. How long until they triangulate my position?”
“It shouldn’t take too long. I should probably leave myself. No doubt they’ve managed to get my location. You have my second cell number, right?”
“Yes. Go ahead, ditch it.”
“I’ll just leave it in the car. They’ll have a surprise when they open the trunk.”
“I’m sure they’ve got my location by now. I should hang up.”
“Bye.”
“Bye.”
~ ~ ~
Marshall again entered Sloane’s office. “We just got Yelena’s location, too.”
“Send in Weiss, Meagan, and Nadia. We need to get her. Failure is not an option.”
“The mission went well,” Weiss said, thirty minutes later. “We got her.”
“Good,” Sloane said, “bring her in.”
…TBC…
Chapter 9
Reunion
Danny got out of the car. He was silently praying that he hadn’t hit one of the kids. He walked around the car until he saw a smashed squirrel behind his rear wheels. He sighed quietly. He saw something walking on the sidewalk. “Ben,” he yelled, and ran after the kid.
~ ~ ~
“How’s it going?” Vaughn asked on the phone.
“I think I’ve gained her trust,” Noah said. “Now all I have to do is finish the job.”
“Good. Call me when you’re done.”
“Will do,” Noah said smiling. He hung up the phone. “I think I just bought us some more time,” he said to Lauren.
~ ~ ~
John saw the car parked in the distance. Walking up to it, he took out the keys, unlocked it, got in, and sped away.
~ ~ ~
“That’s the car,” the man said to the backup team. After checking to make sure that the car wasn’t wired to explode, they opened the trunk. Unwrapping the tarp, the man said into his radio, “This is Jack Bauer. We need a medic here, NOW!”
~ ~ ~
Marshall slammed his fists on the desk. “F*&%,” he yelled. “I can’t get it!”
“Access Denied” continued to flash on the screen.
~ ~ ~
The people at APO turned and watched as the person with the black bag over her head was led into the interrogation room. They all knew who it was. Yelena had been caught. The overall consensus of the group was “Now we’re going to get some answers.”
~ ~ ~
Irina picked up the phone. She couldn’t hear a dial tone. The anklet lights weren’t glowing like normal. Walking out the front door, she saw the agents that were assigned to watch her. She walked up to them. “I have a problem,” she said.
“So do we,” they said. Irina watched as they turned the key in the ignition. No sound came from the motor.
“Do you know what happened?”
“Yeah,” the agent in the passenger seat said. He held up his cell phone. The back was removed revealing a burned up computer chip. “We were hit by an EMP.”
~ ~ ~
Vaughn pulled up at the coordinates Marshall had given him. He saw the paramedics loading a stretcher onto the ambulance. Running up to one of the medics, Vaughn asked, “Is everything all right?”
“Sir, this area is off…” He trailed off when Vaughn pulled out his credentials. “Mrs. Vaughn is in critical condition. She has lost a lot of blood. In all actualities, she shouldn’t even be alive. I’m sorry to cut this short, but I have to go.” The medic got into the ambulance and Vaughn watched as it drove away.
A tear slowly made its way down Vaughn’s face. Jack led him back to the car, and proceeded to go to the hospital.
~ ~ ~
The bag was ripped off Yelena’s head. She blinked rapidly as her eyes adjusted to the light difference. She looked over at the door as it opened. A man walked in.
“My name is Marcus Dixon. I’m going to ask you this one time, and one time only. What are your plans for today? What is going to happen?”
Yelena stared at Dixon defiantly.
“I’m not going to ask you again.”
Yelena was silent.
~ ~ ~
“She’s in surgery,” the doctor said when Vaughn asked about Sydney.
“Do you think she’ll make it?”
“I honestly don’t know.”
~ ~ ~
Sloane dialed Vaughn’s cell phone number. “We need you in here. Now.”
~ ~ ~
“Do you want a drink?” Noah asked as Lauren finished setting up the sniper rifle.
“Sure. Would you mind getting me a Dr. Pepper?”
“Not at all,” Noah said, and then went down into the local drug store. He grabbed a couple of items and took them up to the cashier, payed for them, and then went to the bathroom. Taking out one of the hypodermic needles he had bought, he slowly laced Lauren’s drink.
~ ~ ~
Vaughn reluctantly returned to APO, only to be met by Sloane. “We got her. We captured Yelena!”
“Great!”
“Actually, no it’s not. She’s not talking. I heard about how you got Sark to talk and I thought that perhaps you could do that to her.”
“With pleasure,” Vaughn said. “I just have one request.”
“Name it.”
“I don’t want it to be recorded.”
“Legally, I can’t grant that, but we need intelligence. Sometimes sacrifices must be made. It’ll be done by the time you get there.”
“I have one other request, in case the first one fails.”
“What is it?”
~ ~ ~
The doctor managed to extract the bullet from Sydney’s stomach. As the surgery was finishing up, suddenly Sydney’s heart-rate changed. “Get the defibrillator.” Jack watched from the window above as the doctors tried frantically to start Sydney’s heart again.
~ ~ ~
John pulled in the driveway. When he walked inside, he saw Jenny using the Rug Doctor on the blood stain.
“Sorry about that,” John said
“It's okay. Hey, hon, get washed up. Dinner’s almost ready.”
“Good. I’m starving.”
John, Jenny, and Lucy all sat down to a nice meal of spaghetti and meatballs. Little did any of the females at that table know that the man they so casually regarded had actually set the stage for a truly horrendous event.
~ ~ ~
Danny managed to get Ben back to the house just in time for bed time. He sighed in relief when he knew that all three kids were asleep. As he sat there, he slowly drifted off to sleep, the countdown changed to 16 hours left.
~ ~ ~
“Time of death: 12:17 am,” the doctor said as she gently closed Sydney’s eyelids.
~ ~ ~
Just as Vaughn was about to enter the door, he got the phone call from Jack. “She’s dead,” Vaughn heard. He could tell Jack was crying, something he had never seemed capable of to Vaughn. “Are you almost done there?”
“I will be soon,” Vaughn said, with a renewed reason to break Yelena.
“When you get done, I need you to meet me. I no longer have clearance to the Sphere of Life. I need you to get me in.”
~ ~ ~
Yelena watched as the new man entered the room. She saw him glance up to the video camera. She looked up, too. It was off. As soon as she realized this, the man had already pulled her out of her chair and pushed her into the wall. Before she could get up, the man was on her. She felt that he was twisting her neck. “I’d break this in a second if I thought it would do anything. You’re going to tell me what I want to know now or,” the man said, nodding. The door opened and in walked the man named Dixon with Bill.
“Or what?” she spat.
The man got out a gun and pointed it at Bill. Yelena was silent. The only sound that was heard next was the sound of a gunshot.
~ ~ ~
“Has she talked yet?” Lauren asked Cole on the phone.
“She told us to give her an hour. It’s been about 45 minutes.”
“I’ll wait then.”
~ ~ ~
Vaughn watched as Dixon dragged Bill out of the room. He turned back to Yelena. “Well?”
“Fine. There’s a bomb.”
“Where?”
“That’s all I’m going to tell you.”
Vaughn grabbed Yelena by the hair and dragged her back to the table. He left just as long as it took him to go out and get the hydrochloric acid. When he came back in, he didn’t hold back, and, finally, he got Yelena to talk.
~ ~ ~
Cole called Lauren. “She’s talked. Now she’s just a liability. You know what to do.”
“Of course,” she said and turned to look as Noah reemerged on the roof.
Lauren readied her gun, and when she saw the security detail escort a prisoner out, she put the prisoner’s head in her cross-hairs and pulled the trigger. The prisoner dropped. She smiled at Noah, who smiled back as she opened up her Dr. Pepper.
~ ~ ~
Francie picked up the phone. “You asked about Allison Doren,” the scrambled
voice said.
“Yes.”
“I have a location.”
~ ~ ~
“Mr. President, we have a situation,” Director Chase said after Sloane informed her of the interrogation of Katya. “I would recommend an immediate evacuation of all of Los Angeles.”
~ ~ ~
Cole dialed Lauren’s number. She answered. “They’re evacuating. Everything’s on target.”
“Good,” she said, not noticing Noah making sure he had enough bullets in his magazine.
~ ~ ~
Vaughn managed to get into the safe house with Jack in tow. He pulled the correct levers, and activated the Sphere of Life.
~ ~ ~
Sydney woke up in the body bag. She looked at her hand. The <O> was clearly visible.
…TBC…
I hope someone enjoys this chapter. PLEASE R & R. *Not to sound desperate of course* Four deaths occurs in this chapter. Let me know what you think.
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Chapter 10
Snowman
Vaughn, leaving Jack at the safe house, ran to his car and headed for the hospital. Using his credentials to get past security, he got into the morgue to find Sydney talking to the coroner. He smiled at her, and she flashed a smile back. “So what’s going on?” she asked.
“You died,” Vaughn said, spitting out the words like rancid food. “That @$$&#!% shot you and you died. I had to use the SOL,” he said, knowing he couldn’t refer to it by name in front of the coroner.
“What did we find out?”
“The people planning this attack have been using a laser drill to dig down to tectonic plates in hopes of detonating a bomb to cause a giant earthquake.”
“You’re kidding!”
“I wish. Sloane sent some agents to diffuse the bomb, but an evacuation has been ordered.”
~ ~ ~
Carrie was driving out of town behind her parents. They were toward the front of the group thanks to Marshall’s early warning. She stared at the long line of headlights behind her. Secretly, Carrie was wishing that the evacuation had come earlier or later. She just wished that it had been announced in daylight.
Suddenly, the lights of the car behind her went off, and seconds later, she felt her car get pushed forward upon impact.
Desperately, she slammed on her brakes trying to stop before she rear-ended her parents. The brakes didn’t work. Carrie stared in horror as her car rammed into the back end of her parents car. The crash continued in a domino-effect pattern. The sound of crunching metal was so loud, and then suddenly, all that could be heard was silence.
Carrie pulled out her cell phone, but something was wrong. She was sure the phone had been on, and well charged. Nothing was happening on the display. Having struck out on that end, she ran up to her parents’ car. Even in the darkness, Carrie saw something that would forever haunt her dreams.
They were dead.
~ ~ ~
Lauren finished drinking her Dr. Pepper. She heard a gun click, and turned to see Noah pointing a gun at her.
~ ~ ~
Noah remembered back to when Vaughn had hired him. He had already used the stuff Vaughn had called Ice 5. He said it would quickly freeze-dry Lauren from the inside out. Enough time had passed since she had first ingested it in the kind gesture of the Dr. Pepper he had bought her.
He also remembered the second thing Vaughn had given him: something called “Boom Bullets.” Trusting that the bullets would work, he pulled the trigger. Lauren looked down as the icy mist covered her body. Noah had to turn his head as Lauren exploded in front of him.
Remembering what Vaughn had said about having conclusive proof, Noah took out a little broom and swept little frozen chunks of Lauren into a plastic bag. He sealed it up and dialed Vaughn’s number.
~ ~ ~
Vaughn picked up the phone when it rang. On the other end he heard Noah say, “It’s done. Do you have my payment?”
“Yes. Thank you for your assistance.”
“Who was that?” Sydney asked, looking at Vaughn.
“Marshall,” Vaughn said. “He’s having trouble hacking John’s files and he
wondered if you had seen anything that might have said what it was.”
“No, but I still might have a way to get past the password. Let’s stop at the safe house where Mom is.”
“You’re calling her Mom?”
“I know it’s stupid, but I believe in second chances. Even for her.”
~ ~ ~
Irina paced in her darkened house wondering what was happening. She didn’t want to tell anyone that she thought she had caused the EMP. The only person she had ever told about her other ability was Sydney. She heard a car pull up in front of her house. There was a knock. Irina answered. She saw Sydney standing at the step along with her husband.
“What is it?” Irina said rubbing her head.
Sydney was distracted. Vaughn spoke up. “We need your help.”
~ ~ ~
Sydney was shocked when Irina opened the door. As soon as she laid eyes on her mother, a weird sound started echoing in her head. Focusing, she could make out the words, “EMP,” “Caused,” and “Daughter.”
Sydney managed to get her mind back on topic after Irina agreed to help. Choking out, “I need to talk to Mom,” Sydney got in the back and waited until the door closed to speak up. “Mom? What’s going on?”
~ ~ ~
Carrie carefully checked the other cars. Some of the people were alive; others were dead. As time went on, Carrie started to realize what had happened.
~ ~ ~
Marshall dialed Carrie’s number. “The customer you are trying to reach is unavailable right now. Hang up and try again later.”
All of the automated voices were driving him nuts. The “Access Denied” from the computer and now this from his phone were too much. In a fit of sudden rage, he slung his cell phone across the room, just to watch it break when it hit the wall.
~ ~ ~
Vaughn stopped to pick up Jack on his way to APO. Sydney moved to the front seat, and Jack got in back with Irina after giving Sydney a big hug.
On the way to APO, Jack and Irina started to fight. When it had gotten to be too much, Sydney called back, “Knock it off, you two! You’re acting like an old married couple.”
~ ~ ~
John finished loading the rest of the stuff in the car. “You ready?” he asked his wife and daughter. They both agreed and the whole family started off to evacuate. Jenny was completely confused when John pulled into an abandoned warehouse. She was even more confused when John pulled a gun.
~ ~ ~
Nadia and Meagan helped escort Yelena back to her cell. Sloane had actually been pleased when Vaughn activated the Sphere of Life. Figuring more info was to be given, Sloane ordered Weiss to handle the interrogation this time. Not knowing if Weiss could succeed, Sloane had secretly ordered that Yelena be injected with sodium pentathol.
~ ~ ~
Noah cleaned up the mess that Lauren had made. He then vacated the rooftop with the bag in hand. As he headed down the stairs, he said to himself, “The Snowman is back.”
~ ~ ~
Bill woke up from the sedative that he had been given. He noticed the bulletproof vest was gone. He knew from these clues that everything had gone according to plans. After this realization sunk in, he realized that his arm was back in its socket. He nearly fainted when he saw that he had his leg back.
~ ~ ~
As Vaughn continued to drive, Irina finished up her explanation. “Since I’m a direct descendent of Rambaldi, I’m assuming that when I was resurrected by the Sphere of Life, my genetic sequence was altered a little bit, allowing me to do what I can do. Since you just got resurrected, and you are a descendent of me, and therefore of Rambaldi, you have the ability to read my mind. With this ability, I’m hoping that you can see that my motives are correct. I hope you can see that I have changed.”
“Yes, I can,” Sydney said amazed. There was one thing, however that Sydney could tell that Irina wasn’t telling her, and what was driving Sydney so mad was that she couldn’t figure out what it was.
~ ~ ~
Marshall carefully put his phone back together, while also using the program he had written to break the code. There was nothing else he could do but wait, a fact that scared Marshall. Marshall knew the likelihood of getting into the system before the countdown ran out was slim to none. He didn’t know what the
countdown was for, but he figured that it wasn’t good.
~ ~ ~
“The EMP part of the satellite worked,” Cole said on the phone to John. “Is your team ready to raid ‘Project: Black Hole?’”
“Yes, everything is on target,” John said, and hung up.
The sound of a gun being fired was loud in the warehouse.
~ ~ ~
Irina looked at the computer when the family got to APO. “Access Granted,” she said. Marshall’s eyes nearly popped out of his head when the screen changed, allowing him full access to the files that had been so elusive.
~ ~ ~
“One ticket to Washington D.C,” Francie said at the ticket counter.
“One-way or round trip?” the lady at the desk asked.
“One-way,” Francie said.
“Any luggage?”
“No. Nothing,” Francie said. Her friend from D.C. said that he’d take care of
everything while she went after Allison.
…TBC…
Here's the next chapter. Also in her review, boyscoutswoman told me that I jump around too much in the story, so I am telling one story at a time. Let me know if you like it this way or the other.
Chapter 11
Doppelganger
Marshall typed quickly at the computer. Bypassing firewall after firewall, he managed to find a password. Typing it into the necessary area, he discovered that he would be able to deactivate the bomb remotely. Marshall told the agents on site how to remove the explosive core, and they started heading back to APO.
~ ~ ~
Kendall walked down the hallway to Agent Walker’s office. He stopped in his tracks, however, when the lights started to explode above him. Kendall ran to try to see what was going on, and as he rounded the corner into the front area, he saw a team of people in tactical gear. One saw him and shot.
Kendall dropped and rolled behind the desk the secretary usually sat at. He unholstered his gun, and shot. He saw one member of the team drop. He was about ready to shoot again when a man suddenly came around the desk with his gun drawn.
Kendall held up his hands. The man with the gun reached forward to grab Kendall by the shirt, and Kendall used the opportunity to disarm the man and shoot him. He looked around the desk again. No more guards were visible. He got up and ran for the Rambaldi section. He had to secure it. He could not fail.
Kendall swiped his card and managed to get into the room that was used to store the Rambaldi artifacts. He looked around the empty room. He had failed. He could feel his muscles tighten up. He had to get the stuff back.
He pulled out his cell phone. He dialed a phone number that he never thought he’d have to dial again: (407) 511-4794. “Sydney Vaughn,” the voice on the other end said.
~ ~ ~
Jenny covered Lucy’s eyes once she realized what John was planning. Seeing her husband stick the gun in his mouth and angle it up didn’t leave much room for interpretation. The gunshot that followed sealed the deal. Jenny was not looking forward to calling Lucy’s mother to tell her about what happened.
~ ~ ~
Victor stared at Bill across the cell. The unnatural silence was heavy. Suddenly an agent entered the cell. “You,” he said pointing, “come with me.”
Victor walked over to the guard. He followed behind as the guard led him to Sloane. Sloane looked at him. “Victor, three and a half years ago you were sent to prison for having conspired with terrorists. You plea-bargained and therefore got a reduced sentence. You have satisfied your sentence and are now a free man. Now that the official stuff is over, let me give you some advice.
“You were deceived by your parents,” Sloane continued. “Don’t be so trusting in the future. Also, if your parents contact you, don’t do anything they tell you to. Contact us. We’ll take care of it.”
“Fine,” Victor said, grabbing his personal effects and leaving. As he walked away from the subway station, street thugs surrounded him.
“Give us your wallet,” one of them hissed. Victor showed that he didn’t have one. He was about ready to forcefully take the gun when the thug managed to hit him across the head.
Victor got up slowly hearing the thugs leave. He could feel the blood trickling down the back of his head. He tried opening his eyes to see his surroundings, but he then realized that his eyes were opened, but he couldn’t see anything. “Oh my gosh,” he muttered quietly, “I’m f****** blind!”
~ ~ ~
Francie settled into her seat on the plane. She listened to the safety rules, and then watched as the plane took off.
~ ~ ~
Will was sleeping peacefully. He woke up, however when he heard glass shattering. He took the gun that Sydney had told him to buy for self-defense, and crept down the hall. Holding it out, he looked at the masked figures that were standing in his living room. One shot a tranquilizer dart. Will dropped. The lead masked man ripped off the ski mask. “We need to keep him alive. He could provide intelligence,” Sark said, watching as the men dragged Will out of the house. Sark put his hand up to his new face. Dr. Markovich had been quite accommodating in Sark’s transformation from Sark to Will.
~ ~ ~
Carrie got back into her crumpled car and waited. She had been talking to many of the surviving people. No one’s cell phone worked. They were alone; stranded.
~ ~ ~
Sydney stared intently at her mother. She had to figure out what the secret was. She was distracted when Sloane walked up to her. “I’ve put in an order that you need to see the doctor.”
As she walked down the hall to the medical office, her phone rang. Sydney answered the phone to hear Kendall on the other end. “Agent Vaughn,” he said, “I’ve got a problem. I need your help.”
“What’s your problem?”
“We’ve had a break-in at Project: Black Hole. They stole all the Rambaldi artifacts.”
“How’s that concern me?”
“Your connection to Rambaldi is how it concerns you. Since Agent Vaughn, your husband, is also a direct descendent of Rambaldi, the people who did this no doubt will go after your kids. They are the most pure descendent of Rambaldi. Are they safe?”
“Probably not the safest,” Sydney said concerned, and as she continued talking to Kendall, she headed over to Vaughn to have him drive her home.
By the time that they got to their home, they saw the front door kicked in, with wood splinters laying on the ground. Walking in their trashed house, they came across a body. Jack, Jr. was dead. Vaughn called Jack while Sydney continued to look, gun drawn. Danny, Kim, and Ben were missing.
~ ~ ~
Yelena looked at Weiss as he asked her the most obvious question. “What are your plans for today?”
“All I was informed about was the bomb that would lead to the evacuation. They told me about that and about the EMP.”
“What do you mean?”
“I got captured so that I could give you the information that would cause LA to be evacuated. They then would activate an EMP in order to cause a huge pile-up. If everything’s on schedule, that has already happened.”
“Do you know about any more plans?” Weiss asked pointedly.
“I know there are some, but I don’t know what they are,” she said.
“Who would know?” Weiss asked.
“Cole,” Yelena responded.
~ ~ ~
McKenas Cole looked at the agents that had just stormed the building.
“Drop the gun,” one agent said.
Cole didn’t listen. He shot at one of the agents, and then waited for them to fire back at him. “Suicide by police,” he thought. They didn’t fire. The agents surrounded him and, as the handcuffs were placed around his wrists, he saw an agent call in.
“This is Bauer. We got him.”
~ ~ ~
Victor stumbled around, his arms flailing in front of him. He heard the squeal of breaks, and felt his body fly into the air. The driver of the car got out. He ran to Victor. Placing two fingers at the jugular, he realized that he had just killed a man.
~ ~ ~
Danny awoke with a gash in his head. He could feel the dried on blood on his face, and tried to wipe it away, but his hands were bound. “Hello,” he called out.
“We’re alone,” he heard from a person in the shadows. The voice was familiar.
“Will?”
“Yeah,” Will replied with a groan.
“What happened?”
“They brought you in here, took the kids, and left.”
“How long ago was this?”
“About two minutes ago,” Will responded.
Silence
“What’s that smell,” Danny said out of the blue.
“Smoke,” Will said, noticing the putrid smell that was consuming the air.
…TBC…
I just copied this from SD-1, so if I have something written that doesn't make sense, like the PM list, sorry.
