Archive of Our Own (BETA rev. 2850)

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PART ONE

October 16, 2008

"What do you think it will take for you to find closure?"

Sydney tried to muster a smile for Judy Barnett, but she knew her attempt was weak. "My problem is that I have too much closure in my life."

"It's been more than two years, Sydney. Everyone loses people they care about, and most of us learn to move on. You've done that yourself in the past. Why can't you do it now?"

"I'm happily married. I enjoy being a mother. I do my job well. I'd say I'm managing."

"But you remain haunted."

Haunted. The word fit too well.

"I didn't just lose someone," she said slowly. "I lost everyone. And I lost them because I failed them."

"You can't continue believing that all of this was your fault."

"Why not? I couldn't save Dad and Nadia from Sloane. I couldn't save Mom from herself." The sound of breaking glass echoed within her. "The Rambaldi prophecy – the one on page 47 – it claimed I would bring the ultimate power to utter desolation. That can sound terrible, or wonderful, depending on what you think the ultimate power is. I turned those words around in my mind every way I could, for years. But when the big showdown came, you know what I did? Nothing. I didn't even stop Mom in the end. She just fell through a window. I was – irrelevant."

Dr. Barnett leaned forward, her face kind. "If you hadn't arrived when you did, your mother might have managed to begin her attack. And your father died in action, which is a risk every CIA operative takes. The two of you were able to say some important things to each other before the end. Not everyone gets that chance."

Imagining her father as she'd last seen him – bloodied and pale, trembling on his feet as he watched Sydney go – made Sydney's throat tighten. "I'm grateful for that. But I'd rather have him here, awkward silences and all."

"I realize that."

"What you don't realize – the part nobody seems to understand –" Sydney struggled for the words. "From the day my father told me that SD-6 wasn't part of the CIA, my life – shattered. Even before then, I had to live as two people: the spy and the normal girl. After I found out I wasn't working for the good guys, everything became even more fragmented. I was one person for Sloane. Another for Dixon. Another for Vaughn. Another for my father. Another for my friends. It changed me. There were days I thought it would kill me. I always thought, once I beat the bad guys, it would be over. I could be whole."

She remembered Nadia in her coffin. Mom's dead hand still clutching at one of Rambaldi's devices. Her father struggling to his feet to watch her go.

"Now I know I'll never be whole," she whispered. "I'll never put all the pieces together again."

"Sydney, if you continue to let this burden you, how long do you think the rest of your life can remain unaffected? You take great pride in your work, real joy in your marriage and your child – but grief can corrode even the best parts of life, if you let it."

"I won't let it."

"Is that really enough for you?"

Sydney sighed. "It has to be."

**

She walked out of counseling in such a dark mood that it didn't surprise her in the slightest when she learned that – for the first time in more than two years – they were chasing a Rambaldi artifact.

"We'd thought most of the followers gave up active pursuit after the fall of Arvin Sloane and Irina Derevko," Dixon said. He didn't give Sydney a glance as he spoke, sympathetic or otherwise, and for this she was grateful. "Overall, the Rambaldi cultists seem to be settling into a group dedicated to esoterica and mysticism rather than criminal activity. However, the Flame appears to inspire the exceptions to the rule."

Next to her, Vaughn asked, "The Flame – I don't know that one. My dad never wrote about it."

"It's not in any of the main Rambaldi documents collected by Project Black Hole," Dixon said. "In fact, the principal notations we have about it come from some of the extant writings of Arvin Sloane."

As always, after Sloane's name was spoken, a silence fell in the room. Everyone at APO knew of his ultimate fate – trapped beneath crushing weight, in agonizing pain for all eternity, yet immortal. CIA scientists observed him 24/7, taking his blood, running tests and never listening to his pleas for mercy. His fate was cruel beyond the bounds of cruelty, and while nobody at the table would argue that Sloane could be set free, none of them took pleasure in his torment.

Dixon broke the strange moment by punching up an image on the viewscreen. There, in Sloane's handwriting, was a small sketch of a pendant in the shape of a twisted S – or, perhaps, a flame – and a bit of poetry. To Sydney's surprise, she recognized the words, which were not vague Italian prophecy but a verse in English, one she knew:

We shall not cease from exploration.
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.

"That's T.S. Eliot," she said. "Please tell me he wasn't into Rambaldi too."

"Might explain 'The Waste Land,'" Vaughn murmured. Sydney gave him a small smile.

Dixon said, "We also found this in one of Irina Derevko's notebooks."

A new slide, another sketch which, though slightly different, obviously showed the same S-flame shape. Beneath it was a bit of writing – just a couple of lines, and obviously a transcription of some Rambaldi document now lost. Although Sydney's medieval Italian was not especially strong, she could get the gist of it:

She shall free herself from the ice of Cocytos
Those who behold her will drink of Lethe
And she shall not cross the Styx alone.

Whatever that meant.

"As you can see, Rambaldi's message isn't particularly useful. All we know from Sloane's notes is that the Flame possesses enormous power – but he personally disdained it, thinking it of no use to him," Dixon said. "Some others out there don't agree. We've intercepted two attempts to infiltrate Project Black Hole so far, from teams searching for the Flame's location. We can expect more attempts in future. Unless, of course, we head them off at the pass."

"By taking the Flame for ourselves," Sydney said. Yes, this felt like old times: chasing after Rambaldi artifacts for no reason other than to prevent others from holding them. What the hell. She didn't mind ruining some Rambaldi followers' day. "I take it that Project Black Hole doesn't have the Flame, but has information about where it is?"

Dixon shifted the viewscreen again to show some smaller notes in the margin of Sloane's page. "Sloane suspected that it had been stored in a vault held by a chemical weapons expert and Rambaldi follower who was active in the 1970s, Manuel Ruiz. Luckily for us, Ruiz's lab in Baja California Sur has been defunct for decades, and there's no sign of current security – or any activity whatsoever."

Baja California Sur – hardly an hour's flight. She'd be home for dinner. Sydney sighed. "Let's move."

After the meeting broke up, Sydney was glad to see Vaughn fall into step beside her on her way to the equipment room. "Think you and Rachel will be back before Isabelle goes to bed tonight?"

"Hope so." She and Vaughn had requested that only one of them be assigned to any given mission, the better to ensure that Isabelle had a parent at home most of the time. It worked best for them as a family, but Sydney sometimes missed the rush of being with Vaughn in the field. "Do you miss it? Us being out there together?"

"We'll get back to it someday."

That wasn't a yes. Sydney studied Vaughn's face, and though she saw love there, she saw something else too – the knowledge that they could never really go back to the way things had been before. They'd both changed, become sadder but stronger. And now she knew who and what Vaughn really was, the secrets he was capable of keeping. Their trust had survived, but her old belief that she was being followed into action by a "guardian angel" who thought only of protecting her – that was gone for good.

What would we have been like, if I'd always known the truth about him? Sydney didn't doubt that they would still have fallen in love; she couldn't imagine a world in which she didn't love Vaughn. Instead, she wondered if they might not have loved each other better without stupid lies and illusions in the way.

But there was no point in hoping for something that could never be. Particularly not when what they did have was as good as this.

Sydney pulled Vaughn close to kiss him goodbye, and for a few moments, she was too happy to feel the shadow of regret.

**

Cuidad Constitucion, Mexico

"Ugh," Rachel said.

"My thoughts exactly." Sydney brushed a thick curtain of cobwebs away from the door of Ruiz' lab. "At least we don't have to wear high heels for this one."

Rachel grinned; although she'd become almost as adept as Sydney in disguise work, she still preferred any assignment that let her go casual. Sydney – for once wearing jeans, boots and a simple long-sleeved T-shirt – definitely understood the feeling.

Their flashlight beams cut through the corridors of the lab as they made their way across broken linoleum toward the back rooms where the vaults were said to be. Once, they heard a skittering that made Rachel start, but then she laughed softly. "There I go. Jumping at mice again."

Sydney believed the small intruder was more likely to be a tarantula, but she thought it might be better not to mention it.

The vaults were behind a locked door that had remained sturdy despite years of disuse; it took Sydney and Rachel a few minutes of hammering before they got it open. Without even asking each other about it, they both went to vault #47 to try it first. Sydney motioned toward the lock, inviting Rachel to try out her safecracking skills – which turned out to be good enough to find the combination in just three turns.

"How am I doing, Mr. Miyagi?" Rachel tossed her blonde hair over one shoulder as she tugged the rusty vault door open.

"Not bad, Daniel-san. Not bad at all." They'd have to drop that old joke soon, Sydney thought. It had made sense back in the days when she was truly Rachel's mentor, but given how skilled Rachel had become, it didn't any longer. Maybe they could pick new nicknames, something that put them on an equal footing. Butch and Sundance? She'd think about it.

Sydney reached within the vault, hoping the safe had remained intact enough to prevent tarantula incursion. It was empty save for one thing – a small sliver of amber hung on a black leather cord. As she held it up in the beam of Rachel's flashlight, she saw that the amber had been carved into the exact shape they'd seen in Sloane's notebook, and in the light it glittered the orange-yellow of fire.

"The Flame," Rachel said. "We've got it."

"Let's go."

They hurried back the way they had come, but the creaking floor already seemed to have had enough of bearing weight. At one point, Rachel's foot almost went through the boards, and the slope of the tiles seemed sharper. "We'll be lucky not to bust our butts," Rachel muttered.

"We're okay." Sydney glanced at the uneven path ahead, wondered about that assessment, then quickly put the Flame around her neck. The last thing she wanted was to drop this thing down into the foundation of the building and have to go searching for it amid tarantula nests.

"Did we turn left here?"

"Yeah –"

A board beneath Sydney's foot gave way, and she stumbled to one side. Her head struck the wall, harder than it should have –

Sirens began screeching. Brilliant lights snapped on. Sydney blinked in the sudden brightness as she tried to regain her footing, and she heard someone shout in Spanish, "The intruder has the Flame!"

Shit.

"Come on!" Sydney shouted to Rachel as she started to run. But then she realized –

Rachel wasn't with her.

This building seemed to have the same layout as Ruiz's lab, but it was shiny and new – and well-populated, as the footsteps behind her seemed to indicate.

And Sydney wasn't wearing the same clothes she'd had on only a moment before. The Flame still hung around her neck, but now she had on a tan skirt and boots and some scratchy dark brown polyester sweater or something, and a wig, oh, God, it didn't matter. Only one thing mattered.

She'd lost time.

What was it now? Another two years? Even more? Sydney ran toward the exit, determined to escape her pursuers; she could stay focused on that, no matter what. But her throat was already tightening with sobs she couldn't afford to release.

Isabelle – sweetheart – please don't let me have missed her growing up. Please!

She didn't know who or what she was praying to. She just ran faster.

Sydney slammed through the doors and blinked in surprise; they'd entered the lab at night, but it was now daytime, with sunlight pouring down. Even more astonishing was the old helicopter whirring down from overhead, buffeting her with gale-force winds. Probably those were more guards, she thought, and she turned to run from the helicopter. But then she heard a man's voice cry out over the roar, "Are you Phoenix?"

They know my call sign. Sydney pivoted again and ran straight for the helicopter, throwing herself inside just as the guards came pouring out of the lab behind her.

As they lifted off, one of the agents inside said, "Easy – we've got you." He had rather long hair, but his demeanor otherwise seemed genuine; Sydney, good at evaluating subtle cues, felt confident in her earlier assessment.

"You're CIA," she said. Both of the guys in the back of the helicopter looked at each other in surprise, but they nodded. "You knew to come for me."

"We were told to come here to search for someone called Phoenix."

"Right. That's me." Sydney held up one hand, wordlessly asking them for a moment. As she gulped in a couple of breaths, she told herself that she'd chosen the memory erasure last time. Could she have done it again? What possible reason could she have had? Why would she ever choose to forget years spent with Vaughn and Isabelle? Or was this some unexpected side effect of the procedure she'd had before? Maybe her mind could just drop years of memory at random, now.

Terrified almost to the point of nausea, Sydney looked down at the ground beneath them. Funny how much that really did look like Ruiz's lab. Maybe that was what had cued her memory to start up again – or to drop memories – the likeness between past and present.

"We're taking you back to the L.A. field office," said one of the agents. "Maybe you can fill us in back there."

"I should get in touch with Marcus Dixon. Or maybe Director Chase. Preferably both."

They exchanged confused looks again. "Never heard of them."

This was bad.

"I need to know one thing," Sydney said. "I – I took a blow to the head back there. I'm a little disoriented." That was as much detail as these two needed. "Just tell me what year this is."

She braced herself to have lost two years. Five. Even ten.

And then the agent said, "It's 1978."

**

PART TWO

October 16, 1978


Possibilities:

I have gone insane.
These agents have created an elaborate scenario to trick me, down to the point of putting me in vintage clothes and a wig cut in a Dorothy Hamill wedge style.
This is all part of a hallucination caused by drug exposure or head injury.
The Flame is Rambaldi's time-travel device.

Sydney hated the realization that the last possibility was actually the most likely.

The helicopter had descended through a layer of smog to reach Los Angeles – smog even thicker than usual. The cars on the streets were models from the 70s and 60s, without fail. Most of them were enormous land yachts in colors Sydney hadn't seen on cars in a while, like brick red and sunshine yellow; there were also a few boxy compacts that looked like they'd blow away in a strong breeze and more station wagons than she would've thought ever existed. They'd driven by a movie theater showing both "Foul Play" and "Jaws II." On the radio, Donna Summer was singing "Last Dance." The clothes people wore – the ads on billboards – the fonts on signs – all of it said 1978.

Even the Los Angeles field office had moved, and Sydney was shocked to realize that they were walking through a lobby with only a standard security camera. No computers there to check the faces of those who walked in, and match them against known offenders – God, anybody could get in here.

Then she caught a glimpse of the wary faces of the agents who had retrieved her and realized they were thinking much the same thing.

"You're not going to give us a name?" one of them asked.

"No. I'm Phoenix. You knew I was coming." That was the part of this that made no sense whatsoever – not that the rest of it fit together perfectly, but still. Sydney could just accept that Rambaldi's Flame had sent her back in time, but how had it been able to tell people in the past that she was on the way? "I'll talk to the task force leader. That's it."

They accepted that, however unhappily, and led her through hallways thick with cigarette smoke and clacking with the crazy din of typewriter keys. Eventually they brought her to a small conference room not unlike its modern counterparts. Times and fashions might change, but ill-funded offices would always have indifferent beige tiling and fluorescent lights.

Sydney sat down heavily, frowning as she realized that 70s office chairs were even less comfortable than their 2008 equivalents. She pulled off the auburn wedge-cut wig and tugged her hair free; it hung as long as it had that morning when she got ready for work. After a moment's hesitation, she pressed her fingers to her side. Through the thin tan polyester of her skirt, she could feel the line of the scar the Covenant had given her. So, it really was her – not just her consciousness in another body.

Not that she'd heard of Rambaldi devices being able to transplant consciousnesses, but Sydney thought it was best to rule out every possibility she could.

The door opened behind her. Before Sydney turned, she heard, "At last, something about Rambaldi turns out not to be so much smoke and mirrors."

She froze. It took her a few long moments to look at the speaker, though she had known his voice from the first word.

Arvin Sloane, 30 years younger than she remembered him, wearing a pale gray three-piece suit and a wide baby-blue tie, smiled at her. "So you're the mysterious Phoenix. Any chance we'll find out where you're from?"

Sydney managed to ask, "How did you hear about me?"

Sloane took a seat opposite her at the table. "Another Rambaldi device offered a code that we were able to crack, which told us to find someone important called Phoenix at certain coordinates. I honestly believed I was sending the team out on a wild goose –" His voice trailed off as he stared at Sydney, but then he shook his head and chuckled, almost bashfully. "Excuse my staring. It's just that you bear a remarkable likeness to someone I know."

Your best friend's wife. Sydney felt an almost irresistible urge to run from the room that instant. Her natural distrust of Sloane had collided with the pure weirdness of the situation, and she wasn't sure how much longer she could go without screaming, or bursting into wild laughter.

But she held on to herself, thinking, Sloane understands more about Rambaldi than you ever will. That means he's probably your best bet at getting out of this.

In order for him to help her, though – he'd have to know what the Flame was truly capable of. That meant Sydney would have to tell him the truth.

No, not the whole truth. First of all, that would give him far too much power and even influence the future, if science fiction movies were to be believed; second, she simply didn't have enough time to go through all the incredible twists and turns of their story. Even thinking about explaining it all exhausted her.

Yet who better to believe a preposterous story about time travel than Arvin Sloane?

She took a deep breath. "I'm not a Rambaldi follower. I don't know how the code led you to me, or why. But I know that I –" Getting this out was hard. "I need your help."

"What do you mean?" Sloane looked so different, with dark brown hair, an unlined face and even sideburns; as dated as his wardrobe and hairstyle were, he still came across as well-groomed, dapper – like himself. They were probably about the same age.

"This is going to sound fantastic, but hear me out." Sydney looked into his eyes, willing his zealot's belief to turn to her advantage, just this once. "I believe that the Flame sent me back in time to you. I don't belong in 1978. I'm a CIA operative from 2008."

For a few seconds, they simply stared at one another. Sloane finally leaned back in his chair and breathed out, not quite a laugh. "You realize I have to send you for a psych screen."

"Of course. You should have a doctor check me out as well. But I don't think I'm insane or that I'm hallucinating. I know I've traveled in time."

"For what purpose?"

"I don't know. Maybe for no purpose. I didn't choose this. The Flame made it happen. I didn't even realize it had that power until – well, until I was here."

"If you had no idea of the Flame's power, why were you pursuing it?"

"I had my orders."

"That's not really an answer."

"I think you understand the concept of need-to-know," Sydney said. She remembered the bitter lie behind SD-6 and had to force back a hot spur of anger; with difficulty, she let the moment pass and regained her calm. If Sloane glimpsed her distrust, he would begin to doubt her in turn. "It's more important now than ever."

Sloane considered her carefully, steepling his hands in a gesture she found disconcertingly familiar. "The disturbing part of all this is that I think I believe you." He glanced down at his notes – which, to Sydney's dismay, showed the same sketch of the Flame that she'd seen in Dixon's briefing that morning. "My God. This is amazing. And all this time I thought Rambaldi was merely – a dream."

Great. I'm the one responsible for converting him. The irony of it nauseated her, and Sydney wondered if she'd ever sleep well again. For now she had to remain focused. "Set up the psych screen and the medical exam. We need to establish the truth of what I'm saying as soon as possible, and I need you to figure out how to get me back to 2008."

"Who says you're meant to go back?"

That son of a bitch. Her fists clenched hard enough for her nails to cut into her palms. "You want to keep me here against my will?"

"Naturally I'd prefer that you are wherever or whenever it is you're meant to be. But if what you're saying is true – if Rambaldi is truly this all-knowing – do you maybe have a purpose here? Is there something in the past you're, well, intended to accomplish?"

Sydney fought back the words. Like killing you so you can't hurt anyone else? Like informing on my mother to the CIA? I can think of lots of things I could do here –

Then the implications of all that hit her, the potential responsibility for all those decades to come, and she felt almost dizzy.

Can I do it? Should I?

Quickly, to disguise her confusion, she said, "We can't know that. And I don't think we should assume."

She expected Sloane to argue with her some more, but instead he nodded. "Okay. We'll figure this out."

He seemed – sincere. Even kind.

Then it hit her: Sloane didn't believe in Rambaldi before. He hardly does now. This is before he betrayed my father and slept with my mother. Before the Alliance. Before Jacquelyn. Before everything went wrong. This – this is the man Sloane used to be.

A good man.

"Come on." Sloane stood and opened the door for her, almost courtly. "Let's get you to the quacks."

When he smiled at her, Sydney managed an uneven smile in return.

**

PART THREE

"What's two plus two?"

"Four."

A small beam of light was shined into Sydney's eyes, making her blink.

"What's the capital of France?"

"Paris."

Following the doctor's motions, Sydney touched her nose with one hand, then with the other.

"Who is the president of the United States?"

"Jimmy Carter was elected in 1976."

A small rubber hammer thumped at her knees, which obediently kicked on cue.

"Who reads the nightly news on CBS?"

"It's –" No doubt they weren't looking for "Katie Couric" as the right answer. Sydney dredged up the name from distant childhood memory. "Walter Cronkite."

The blood pressure cuff tightened around her upper arm, then relaxed. Her doctor shrugged; the nurse at his side wore a white dress and a paper cap, just like a Halloween costume. "You seem perfectly healthy and sane."

Sydney smiled thinly. Who ever would've thought that was bad news?

They left her alone to change out of the hospital gown and into some other clothes they'd provided for her: jeans (higher-waisted than Sydney was used to, and rather stiff, but otherwise unobjectionable), tennis shoes (dark blue with white stripes along the sides) a Western-style plaid shirt with snaps instead of buttons, and a bright-green puffy vest to wear outdoors. She took careful note of the style differences in the clothes, both to keep herself focused and to remind herself that yes, this was all completely real.

If this was real – if she had in fact returned to 1978 and had the ability to change events – did she have the responsibility to do so?

I could stop 9/11. I could prevent the Iranian hostage crisis. I could warn against any number of political assassinations. I could expose Aldrich Ames and Robert Hanssen. I could advise the CDC about testing the blood supply for HIV much earlier.

Those were big – maybe too big for one person to accomplish. If she walked into Sloane's office and started spouting off a few decades of history, and how best to change it, she might not be believed. Would a nation still in the grip of the Cold War believe that, in 2008, its greatest danger was a small group of terrorists who lived in Afghan caves? Besides, changing even a few events early on might alter the world landscape so that her warnings would soon become useless.

But there were other things she could do, smaller deeds that would nonetheless have real impact.

For instance, she could tell Arvin Sloane that his best friend's wife back in Virginia was an agent of the KGB.

Turning in her mother would spare the lives of many American agents – including Vaughn's father. It would bring her dad into disgrace again, but Sydney could exculpate him in her original statement and spare him prison time. At least this way the deception would be over earlier, and Irina Derevko would be safely in custody instead of going free to turn into – into whatever it was she had become in the end.

Sydney's hands shook as she fastened the final snap on her shirt. Could she really do this? Could she inform on her own mother? If she could find the courage to do it –

--then Nadia will never be born.

She leaned against the wall, suddenly weary. At times it had seemed as though nothing could be crueler than having found her sister only in adulthood, then losing her so soon. The only thing worse would be never having known Nadia at all.

And Nadia was only one person, only one example of the damage Sydney's meddling could do. If she exposed her mother, who was to say the Russians wouldn't find a way to extract her, or arrange an exchange? The upshot of that could be Irina Derevko getting a jump start on building her criminal organization – in which case she might become too powerful to stop. Convincing Sloane of Rambaldi's power sooner didn't seem like a good idea either, and she might already be stuck with that.

Beyond her personal sphere, the damage could be even greater. If Sydney told them the USSR wasn't going to be around in 15 years, would the United States become complacent and perhaps lose the Cold War this time around? If she told them of the damage to be done by al Qaeda, would the CIA begin preemptive strikes in Muslim countries – taking innocent lives and awakening an even more violent tide of anti-Americanism? Maybe not – but maybe so.

No. She wouldn't rewrite history. It wasn't her role to play God. Sydney had seen what could happen when people let themselves believe otherwise, and she didn't intend to fall prey to the grandiose delusions that had undone her mother and Arvin Sloane.

Sydney had only one responsibility: Get back, as soon as she could.

**

They showed her into a conference room with brass lamps and a free-standing ashtray that appeared to have seen a lot of use. Several officers sat around the table, wearing a fairly ghastly collection of polyester suits and more facial hair than Sydney had seen in one place outside of the Middle East. Sloane's chair was at the table's head; Sydney noted that there was still a water pitcher behind him, albeit one of avocado-green Tupperware.

"You've shared this news very freely," Sydney said to him, instead of hello.

Sloane pursed his lips, acknowledging this. "It's too important not to get a wide range of opinions."

Sydney took the seat farthest from him – though only one other chair sat empty at the table, the one next to her, so it wasn't as if she had many options. "You don't want to believe in Rambaldi, so you've invited lots of people into the meeting to talk you out of it."

His expression changed with the realization that she was correct. "I have to say, Phoenix, you're good at reading people."

"I don't give a good goddamn if she can read people," said a chunky guy near Sloane. "What I want to know is who the hell she's trying to fool, telling us she's from the future."

Someone else, a man with a bristly mustache, muttered, "Is she going to start telling us how everybody's got their own rocketship?"

Sydney leaned back in her chair and lifted her chin. "If you want to know what the future's like, I suggest you stop thinking in terms of 'The Jetsons.' And I also suggest you don't ask me. I'm not here to share information about the future. I'm not here for any reason at all. I just need to get back."

A third officer demanded, "You're from the future, and you're not even going to give us intel we can use?"

"I don't think that's a good idea," Sydney said.

Sloane leaned forward slightly, the way he did when he wanted to be especially convincing. "What if that's the purpose behind your trip, Phoenix? Isn't it possible that this is why Rambaldi sent you back?"

"I don't know why I'm here. All I know is –" Sydney stopped as she remembered the inscription her mother had copied: Those who behold her will drink of Lethe.

In Greek mythology, Lethe was a river in Hades – the river of forgetting.

"Phoenix?" Sloane studied her intently.

"I don't think I could tell you about the future even if I wanted to," she said slowly. "If I've understood the Rambaldi documents correctly, then you won't remember my trip after I return to the future. I think I'm going to remember coming here, but you won't remember anything about it. I don't even know if there will be any evidence that I was ever here." That was a lot to draw from very little evidence, but at this point Sydney had begun to believe she understood some of how Rambaldi's particular brand of crazy worked.

There was no way for her to be positive. She would need to be cautious, to reveal as little about the future as possible in case she was wrong. And, as Sydney scanned the room, she realized the others had little faith in her interpretation.

Sloane at least was willing to listen. "Explain to me why you think this." Sydney repeated the three lines, and after a moment he nodded. "I hate to say it, but given what we know of Rambaldi's work, that makes sense."

"It doesn't sound like it makes sense," somebody grumbled. "It sounds – convenient."

Sydney narrowed her eyes. "Believe me, nothing about this is convenient."

Sloane smiled at her, a sign of solidarity that she found surprising, given the doubt and consternation in the room. Then she remembered, again, that this was the man he had once been; the independence that would eventually turn him rogue was still a strength, now – the courage to defy the crowd for the benefit of an outsider. "We'll have opportunities to debate what this means later. For the time being, we need to focus on the here and now. Our first priority is to obtain another Rambaldi device, a padlock known as the Ember."

"We're chasing after gadgets again?" the chunky guy demanded. "How long are we going to dick around with this Rambaldi bullshit?"

You have no idea, Sydney thought.

"According to the few Rambaldi documents in CIA hands," Sloane said, "when the Flame is placed within the Ember, the Flame is 'extinguished' – which suggests that the time-traveler returns to her original destination."

"It doesn't sound to me like you've done that much research on it," Sydney said. She'd never expected to argue with Sloane again about Rambaldi – and certainly not to say he hadn't thought about the subject enough.

He shrugged. "With Rambaldi, we're left with guesswork." Astonished to hear these words in Sloane's voice, Sydney blinked. Then the door opened, and Sloane said, in a familiar tone, "Ah, there you are."

Dad? Sydney glanced toward the door in sudden hope, but the man walking in was not her father. Of course it wasn't; her family still lived in the D.C. suburbs at this point, Jack Bristow's transfer to the Los Angeles field office not yet enacted. Even as she came to grips with that disappointment, she realized that the new agent was familiar. Something about his hair – his eyes –

"Phoenix, this is Bill Vaughn," Sloane said. "Resident expert on Milo Rambaldi, though I'm trying to catch up. Did your call to the Vatican run long, Bill?"

"It was productive," Bill said, in a voice so like his son's that Sydney felt an overwhelming longing for home. "The new pope's influence in Eastern Europe should be tremendous. This is going to be huge for our Soviet Bloc operations. But that's for us to discuss another day. We can learn a lot more about the future starting now."

He turned to Sydney then, and she didn't like what she saw. Yes, this man looked like Vaughn – somewhat older, a bit heavier, but the resemblance was there. Yet the decency she had always sensed in Vaughn was absent. Vaughn had frightened her less when he was on the verge of going rogue than Bill did just sitting across the table and smiling. Sydney knew that Vaughn had always powerfully felt the lack of his father in his life; that absence might have been a good thing, whether or not Vaughn ever realized it.

"Why should I tell you about the future when you won't be able to remember anything I say after I return?" she said.

Bill leaned closer. Something in the shape of his face reminded her of Isabelle – reminded her that this was her daughter's other grandfather. "We might have time to act while you're still here," he said. "Depending on how long you remain."

"I won't stay long."

"That's one possibility," Bill said.

Sloane stood, drawing attention back to him. "The extent of what Phoenix should tell us or the length of her stay here in 1978 remains theoretical until we have the Ember in our possession. Only after we gain control of that device can we honestly say we have control over the situation. Agreed?"

Around the table, people began to nod. Sydney couldn't help but admire how smoothly Sloane had sidestepped the argument to get his way.

The only question was whether his way was meant to help her – or to go after Rambaldi. Even now, as the good man he'd once been, Sloane might not be able to tell the difference.

**

At the end of the day, after darkness had fallen, it was decided that Sloane could drive Sydney to the safe house in his car – a tan Mercedes she dimly remembered. For years she'd believed she had no recollection of staying with the Sloanes during her father's imprisonment; now she realized that, while she'd retained no conscious memories of Arvin or Emily, she did remember this car. During her childhood, it had seemed enormous to her, but it was actually rather small. Desperate for something to say that would be harmless – not loaded with meaning -- she punched the cassette deck to see what tape he was listening to. It proved to be Rumours by Fleetwood Mac. "I like this album," she said as Sloane climbed into the driver's seat. It sounded ridiculous to her – laughably trivial – but he smiled politely.

"People are still listening to Fleetwood Mac in 2008?"

"Oh, sure. There's a big interest in classic rock."

"Classic," Sloane repeated, amused. He started the car, slid the tape back in and stepped on the gas. The moment Lindsey Buckingham began singing, Sloane said, "The safe house will undoubtedly be bugged. I sweep my car daily, so I can assure you it's clean. The music would drown out any attempts to eavesdrop from the outside. If there's anything else about this situation I need to know, you should tell me now."

"I've been telling the truth," Sydney said quickly. "About my being a CIA agent, how I got here, the Flame, all of it."

"That's good to know," Sloane said. "I also thought you might understand some risk in this situation that I wouldn't be able to see."

"I don't understand anything about this situation. I had no idea this could happen. I'm – without an agenda. Besides getting back, of course."

Sloane nodded. "You seem like an intelligent girl. Therefore you no doubt realize that others within the CIA will soon be forming agendas of their own. There hasn't been time for it to happen yet, but as more people come to believe the veracity of your story, the game board will shift rapidly."

"What agenda can they possibly have?" Sydney said. "I was also telling the truth about the Flame apparently erasing all your memories of my visit, at least, as far as I know. So why would they bother pumping me for information they can't keep? I mean, I'll just tell them, if it comes to that. Then I go back, and it's all undone. And if they think they can keep me here long after we get the Ember, then they don't know who they're dealing with."

"They'll try to destroy the Ember, to keep you from going back at all."

"What?" But the truth of his words quickly sank in. If she were kept in 1978 – if the Flame were destroyed – then the CIA would be able to pump her for detailed information about future events and retain that knowledge. Sydney had already figured out that influencing the near future would invalidate her understanding of later years, but she had no problem believing that the CIA brass might fail to grasp the point. "Oh, my God."

"The thought that they would damage something like this – now that we see what Rambaldi's work is actually capable of –" Sloane shook his head in bewilderment.

Not yet, Sydney thought. I need you to stay the man you were. At least for a few more days.

Thinking fast, she said. "I think we can rely on Bill Vaughn not to destroy the Ember."

Sloane glanced away from the road to look at her. "Why do you say that?"

Sydney thought of Vaughn, the first day she'd met him. Rambaldi had already come between them, though she didn't know it then. "Call it an instinct."

"Odd. I've always had the strangest sense that he isn't to be trusted."

"I didn't mean we should trust him. I mean we can use him."

A slow smile spread across Sloane's face. "We think alike, Phoenix."

God forbid.

"One small scrap of amber." At a stoplight, Sloane absently reached out with one hand to touch the Flame, still hanging around Sydney's neck. It was the kind of too-intimate gesture she expected from him, and yet it didn't inspire the queasy annoyance Sydney remembered. It wasn't pushy or presumptive. Just a touch from somebody whose informality seemed more friendly than not. "Unbelievable."

"That's Rambaldi for you." Sydney shifted back slightly in her seat as the car started moving again, breaking the touch. "He's – elusive."

"But you've brought him to us. To me. Whatever I do or don't remember after all of this, I have to believe that I'm going to know, deep down, what Rambaldi is truly worth from now on."

It's my fault, Sydney thought. Had it been her fault all along? Was she the architect of her own tragedies? Nobody could say what was cause and what was effect, not when it came to time travel.

"We're here," Sloane said as they turned a corner. "Anything else you want to say to me?"

I could scream at you for a thousand years and never be done telling you how badly you hurt us all. "I think we've pretty much covered it."

He punched the tape deck, silencing Fleetwood Mac, as they pulled into the driveway.

The safe house looked as old-fashioned and tacky to Sydney as most safe houses did – until she realized that, actually, everything was gleaming and new. Apparently the CIA had blown its entire redecorating budget for safe houses in about 1977. She spent a few seconds taking in her surroundings (coffee brown walls with double-lined trim in honest-to-god metallic gold, a plastic phone in an O shape and shag carpeting) and wondered idly if she could bring any of it back with her, and if so, how much she could get hipsters to pay for it on eBay.

"You'll be safe here." Sloane's tone held just enough meaning for her to understand it on both levels: The agents listening in would hear only a token assurance, but Sloane was also telling her that nobody was likely to question, arrest or detain her during the night. "Someone should've dropped off a few changes of clothing in your size, as well as basic toiletries. The guards outside can go get something for your dinner --- just ask. Plenty of pizza and Chinese in this neighborhood."

"Sounds great."

Sloane stepped toward the door, and Sydney breathed a sigh of relief. After a day as tense as this one, she wanted to sleep very heavily for several hours in a row – something she rarely got to do with both the CIA and Isabelle likely to want her attention at any moment of the night. Maybe she'd watch a little TV first to unwind. Something campy. Was "The Six Million Dollar Man" on in 1978? "Three's Company?"

But Sloane hesitated. Sydney found that she was hoping he would say something, but couldn't imagine what she was hoping for. An apology, perhaps, though he could never know it – and the man standing before her at this moment didn't owe her one yet.

At last he said, "Will you tell me one thing?"

"It's a bad idea."

"This isn't the sort of information likely to cause complications."

"I'll have to judge for myself."

"Fair enough. Tell me -- when did we finally return to the moon?"

"What?" Sydney didn't know what she'd been expecting, but it wasn't that.

"Lunar landings. Apollo 17 was six years ago, for us. It seems like a long time to leave our horizons unexplored." He looked almost boyish. "When do we finally go back?"

This wasn't information he could use to manipulate or scheme. This was just a young man's hope, one she had to dash. "We haven't. Nobody has. There have been unmanned probes from a few countries, but no astronauts."

"You're joking." When he saw that she was serious, Sloane looked crestfallen. "Did we forget how to dream?"

Sydney answered carefully. "Not all of us."

Sloane nodded, accepting that, and went out the door. She stood between the guards for a few moments, watching him go – a man so in love with dreams that he would someday follow them to his doom, and to that of so many others.

The twilight blue sidewalk blurred with her tears; it was the first time in her bewildering journey that she wept.

**

PART FOUR

The phone's ring startled Sydney awake before dawn. Only the unfamiliar, heavy receiver in her hand reminded her where – and when – she was.

"Phoenix?" Arvin Sloane's voice jolted her, even as memory returned. "If we're going after the Flame, we need to head out within the hour."

"I only need ten minutes," Sydney said. "Can you tell me anything more?"

"We're headed to New York City."

The lack of any other explanation was ominous. Either the CIA had changed its agenda, or Sloane had. For the time being, Sydney had no better choice than to trust him. That was never a good sign.

The car took her to an airfield, and she knew her ride right away; everything else might change with the decades, but cargo planes were forever. Sydney stepped inside to see a handful of CIA officers from the day before, including Sloane – and, to her disquiet, Bill Vaughn. She hid any reaction, however, and nodded at them all while efficiently preparing for takeoff. Only once they were in the air did she say, "I take it the Ember is in New York City."

Sloane nodded. "In the keeping of one Donald Ware, a major drug dealer working out of Manhattan who has recently begun expanding his business into the equally lucrative area of weapons sales."

"Is Ware a Rambaldi follower?" Sydney made sure not to glance at Bill Vaughn as she spoke.

"Unlikely. He is, however, currently possessed of considerable influence in those ports and harbors in the New York area that have, shall we say, less than ideal law enforcement. The Ember seems to have passed through as an object of some value, which Ware then pocketed for himself." Sloane glanced down at a mimeographed copy of his notes from yesterday. "We have a man on the inside with Ware, who confirms his possession of the Ember and the fact that apparently Ware keeps it on his person at all times."

Most of the agents groaned. Sydney lifted her chin. "Then we'll always know where it is. That works."

Sloane's smile reminded her too much of her earliest days at SD-6, where she had basked in his approval. "You know the power of positive thinking, Phoenix. I like that."

Another agent in the hold barked, "We're not endangering our operative for the sake of this fairy tale."

"I wouldn't expect you to," Sydney said. "I'm the one who needs the Ember; I'm the one who'll take the risk."

"I'm not convinced this operation should proceed at all." Bill Vaughn could sound smooth even over the rumble of cargo-plane engines. He met Sydney's eyes with a rueful smile that was as charming as it was transparently manipulative. "Speaking frankly, Phoenix – Ware's a dangerous character. We hesitated sending anyone in there in the first place, and going up against him with anybody but our best men is a mistake."

Sydney smiled back. "Speaking frankly -- as of yesterday, I'm your best man. So tell me how I'm getting to Ware."

A brief silence in the cargo plane was enough to tell Sydney she'd won, at least for now. The fact that they were having this discussion at all after wheels-up was enough to tell her how fragile her victory was.

Finally Sloane plowed ahead. "We'll have to move almost entirely independently of our existing operative. Otherwise it's too much of a risk." She nodded. "However, he can ensure that we know Ware's location tonight. The main front for his operations is the city's most popular roller disco."

"Of course it is," Sydney sighed. "Does Ware skate?"

"Only a few times a night. He prefers to spend time in the cocktail area, surrounded by his bodyguards and flunkies." The seriousness on Sloane's face was something she'd seen countless times before, in so many other briefing rooms. Nothing about this situation should have felt familiar, and yet it did. "You'll have your work cut out for you, Phoenix."

"Can I design my own op?"

A few people exchanged looks, but Sloane nodded. Sydney was satisfied.

After this came the long, awkward hours to their destination. Normally Sydney used this time to sleep, because in her life there was no such thing as getting enough sleep. She was far too wired for it at the moment, though, and she knew she needed to monitor the interactions in the cabin.

At one point, as she helped herself to a cup of coffee from a thermos, she felt someone brush against her elbow. Sydney looked up to see Bill Vaughn, who only had eyes for her – or, more specifically, for the necklace around her throat. "Amazing, isn't it?" His fingertip brushed against the edge of the Flame and against her skin; unlike Sloane's curiosity the night before, this was deliberately invasive, almost an open affront. "That something so little can be so powerful."

Was he trying to be sexually threatening? Sydney thought probably so, and wondered why he believed CIA agents of any gender or era would be so easily intimidated.

She took a sip of her coffee and quietly asked, "How's Andre?"

Bill went very still.

"He's got to be getting pretty big now," she continued. A quick review of Vaughn's old stories offered up the ideal tidbit. "He's exactly the age to get really into sports. Like – hockey. Most kids in Southern California are more into baseball or basketball, but I bet Andre likes hockey."

Bill's face darkened, and Sydney knew she was seeing the real man at last. "Keep your voice down and tell me exactly what you know."

"I know enough for you to make sending me back home your top priority." Sydney, thinking of little Vaughn and the father who loved Rambaldi more than him, had to work to keep her voice calm. "I'm not threatening your child. But whatever it is you think you have to gain from grabbing the Flame for yourself, I promise you, it's not nearly as big as what you stand to lose."

"That's not an answer."

"It's all you're going to get. I'll offer some advice, though: You'd be better off spending your time with your son than wasting it on Milo Rambaldi." Sydney turned and made her way across the cargo plane, close enough to the other operatives to ensure Bill wouldn't bring up the subject again.

She'd just played a risky card. Bill would no longer side with those who wanted to keep Sydney in 1978 against her will; she'd won that much. But she knew that Bill was now considering the other alternative – killing Sydney before she could ever get back. That way the Flame would remain in the CIA's hands and be his to steal.

He couldn't do that if she got her hands on the Ember tonight. Sydney knew this grab had to succeed; she might not have another chance.

**

Sydney shopped for necessary supplies on her own. Bill Vaughn and at least one other operative had tried to tail her, but they'd been easy enough to lose. Manhattan startled her with its squalor; the graffiti-thick subways smelled pungent, and the sidewalks were littered with broken glass and dog shit. She even stepped over a used syringe on the outskirts of Bryant Park. It didn't matter much as long as she could find the stores she needed, and even at its worst, New York seemed to have plenty of shopping.

When she returned to their base of operations – an abandoned warehouse across the street from the roller disco – Sydney changed in the only available space, a small closet, while listening to the arguing outside.

"Somebody else should go in there," Bill said. "Somebody should make sure she's not acting on some other agenda we don't know."

"I was thinking you'd suggest we give her some backup," Sloane said dryly. But he had to wonder whether Bill was right; the man outside the closet door might not be the darker Sloane she remembered, but he'd never been a trusting fool. The less time she gave Bill to work on him, the better. Sydney adjusted her wig, opened the door and skated out.

Everyone stared. They were meant to. Sydney had purchased white roller skates, which felt leadenly heavy to her when compared to rollerblades but were still maneuverable. Beneath that she wore pink and silver striped knee socks. She'd found a hot pink satin bomber jacket that looked about right, and some white short-shorts to pair with it. Although the stores had held any number of wig offerings, Sydney had ultimately decided that as long as she was in 1978, there was no reason to settle for less than the full blonde Farrah.

Someone sputtered, "This – this is your idea of covert?"

"No. Sometimes the best place to hide is in plain sight." Sydney rolled closer to Sloane; thanks to the skates, she towered almost a foot over him. "Is Ware inside?"

"He arrived about 20 minutes ago." Sloane looked somewhat dazed. "Are you sure about this disguise?"

"Yes. Anything else I need to know?"

Gathering himself together, Sloane said, "We've managed to smuggle in a small video camera, no bigger than a shoebox. It's in the skate rental area, so we'll be able to keep an eye on you."

A shoebox-sized camera. Marshall would weep. She asked, "Can we communicate?"

"Two-way communication would be too obvious, but try this." Sloane held out a metal clip approximately the size of a deck of cards, then indicated that she should attach it to the inside of her jacket's neck. As she did so, he said, "We'll be able to talk to you the whole time and warn you if the situation changes. Since we can't hear you, if there's anything you urgently need to communicate, try to make visual contact in front of the skate rentals."

Bill Vaughn interjected, "Mind telling us how you're planning on getting the Ember from Ware?"

Sydney shrugged. "I thought I'd wing it."

Before anybody could object, she went out the door and headed straight for the roller disco's neon façade.

Sydney's first reaction was that she fit in a little too well. She'd intended for her sexy, showy outfit to draw Ware's attention, but standing out amid disco fashions was easier said than done. There were girls in short silver dresses and in purple jumpsuits that trailed glittery veils. Some of their dates were dressed to match. Sydney could feel men's eyes on her – she'd done well enough – but attracting Ware would require a little more effort.

Sloane spoke through the device on her coat: "Phoenix, we have visual. Touch your hair if you can read me." Sydney ran a couple of fingers through the curls of her wig. To her the speaker seemed dangerously loud – capable of being overheard, if only by somebody very close – but she reminded herself that this version of the CIA could only work with the tech it had. "Proceed. We'll advise throughout."

Well, that was one more element she'd have to ignore to get the job done. Smoothly she glided out onto the skate floor as a new song started playing – "More Than a Woman." Not a huge dance number, but that could work: the dance floor would be less crowded, and fewer of the skaters would be showing off.

Now all Sydney needed were some good roller disco moves.

On her first circuit around the rink, she simply took in her surroundings as she raised her hands to shoulder height and snapped her fingers to the beat. A quick glide by the skate-rental area showed her a white bag she remembered from the cargo plane; no doubt it held the camera that showed Sloane and the other operatives what she was up to. Next was a mirrored wall – might come in handy later – outlined with an array of spinning lights, flashing beams of yellow, then blue, then green onto the dancers. After that, a wall made up of nothing but lights, which blinked in various patterns and then, finally, the cocktail/viewing area. Sydney spotted Ware right away, holding court in the dead center and paying no attention to the skating whatsoever.

I knew I should've gone for the tube top, Sydney thought.

She started getting her bearing with the skates, turning quickly so that she was moving backward, then forward again. That worked. She tried it another couple of times, using the arms with it, until a few people around her seemed aware that a superior skater was near them and began giving her a bit of space, the better to see what she was going to do.

"Phoenix, what are you doing? You're attracting too much attention. Blend into the crowd." Sloane sounded less accusatory, more confused. It was so odd to realize that there was a time when he hadn't known how she worked.

Sydney sped up and leaped as high as she could, extending into a full split in midair right in front of the cocktail area. As she landed, Sydney took the corner wide, so that her body tilted to one side, then allowed herself to sink into the deepest split the skates would allow. As some people started to cheer, she quickly scissored her legs together to pull herself upright – harder than the way down, really.

While she held everyone's attention, she moved to the center of the floor. This seemed to be the "free skate" area, where people could show off without disrupting the flow of the rink. A mirrored ball hung directly overhead, casting glitter and dazzle down on Sydney.

"This is crazy!" somebody, not Sloane, shouted into the speaker. "Phoenix, if you continue going outside mission parameters, we'll call this off."

No time to waste. She was more or less out of dance moves, but pretty much anything could be put to a tempo. The first thing that came to mind was Burmese bando fighting technique, with all those low sweeping defensive kicks. Sydney dipped into one, then another, letting the music's beat set her rhythm. She hoped that what looked bad-ass in the sparring ring looked at least as impressive on a dance floor.

As the music swung into another chorus, Sydney brought herself up in one lazy spiral – to see Donald Ware standing directly in front of her, wearing a black jumpsuit and a predatory smile.

It shouldn't be this easy, Sydney thought as she grinned right back.

Ware swept an arm around her and began leading her around the rink. She matched her steps to his and gazed back at him with an adoring expression that nonetheless allowed her to take in every detail of his attire. The jumpsuit didn't leave a lot of room for mystery – for instance, she could tell, to her distaste, that he dressed left. But that meant the Ember could only be one place: his wide, spangled belt.

At least the bitching from the loudspeaker had stopped; her ability to pull Ware into her orbit had silenced her critics for now – that, and the fear they'd be overheard.

"You're a good skater," Ware whispered into her ear. He had a heavy New York accent that turned the last word into skaytuh. "I like to dance with all the best skaters, especially when they look as foxy as you."

Sydney giggled. "Ohmigosh WOW you are so GOOD AT THIS," she said as fast as she could. "Ohmigosh."

Ware's hand pressed harder on the small of her back as he began pulling her right hand backward. Sydney realized what Ware was trying to do and tightened her body as he lifted her above his head. Carefully she angled her feet, striking the pose as she tried to think of what dance moves would help her steal the Ember. If Ware led the whole time, she wouldn't have as much freedom; she'd have to seize opportunities where she got them.

He lowered her again and grabbed her hands so that the two of them spun into a linked spiral. Sydney made sure to smile really widely, like she couldn't believe anything so fabulous was happening. Ware was clearly eating it up. Idiot.

Ware then grabbed her around the waist. They were both skating side by side to show off a tricky step he wanted to do. Sydney matched him on the step and gripped him tightly around the belt. Sure enough, a small bulge at the small of his back told her where the Ember had to be.

As they drifted out of the step, Sydney slid her arms around his midriff as if overcome by the experience. Ware smiled down at her indulgently as Sydney made sure his back was to the wall of lights – the one wall where nobody could observe – and deftly tugged the Ember into her palm. It was cool and lightweight, some kind of metal.

Sydney slipped back from him, putting her fists in the pockets of her bomber jacket, as if daring Ware to come get her again. And now the Ember was safely in her keeping, where it was going to stay.

From the speaker, she heard somebody mutter, "Son of a bitch." Sydney hoped it was Bill Vaughn, and her smile became real.

**

They danced all the way through "Macho Man" and well into "Disco Inferno" before Sydney pretended that she wanted to go outside to cool down. To her relief, Ware didn't offer to accompany her. "You get that pretty behind back in here and I'll comp you a drink," he said, patting her ass. "As many drinks as you want."

"Ohmigosh."

He made finger guns at her before he skated away, and Sydney headed toward the door. On the way she surreptitiously snapped shut the pocket of her jacket. The cool autumn air felt bracing against her sweaty skin. Even the clamor of New York's streets seemed peaceful after 15 solid minutes of blaring disco.

Sloane's voice came through the speaker: "Nice work, Phoenix. Go around the corner to your right and head west."

Her better bet was to get a moment's privacy and use the Ember – if she understood how. What if she needed Sloane's help? What if she handled it wrong on her own, either breaking it or, even worse, going back farther in time?

The speaker crackled again. "We've got most of the equipment loaded up already, so you should get into the car that's waiting. We'll follow –" There was a short pause, and Sydney tensed, going on guard. Then Sloane's voice broke in again. "Phoenix, get out, now!"

Sydney started to skate toward the right corner, but, ever vigilant, glanced backward. There she saw Ware and someone else pushing another person out of the roller disco. "You thought you could grab that Italian shit and get away with it?" Ware was bellowing. "Ain't no time I coulda lost it except right before I went out on the rink, and the only guy near me then was you. So now you're gonna get it back for me, and then you're going to die, you stupid fuck!"

He's blaming someone else for stealing the Ember. Sydney's heart sank. Somebody's going to die because of what I've done. Somebody who wasn't meant to die.

Then she got a good look at the person in Ware's clutches, and her eyes went wide.

They'd gone after the CIA's man on the inside – Jack Bristow.

**

PART FIVE

Dad!

Sydney braked in place, turning back as fast as she could to reach her father – who was currently being hustled into the back of a Mack truck. His movements were sluggish, perhaps dazed; they must have already hit him in the head.

"Phoenix, what are you doing?" Sloane said from the speaker on her jacket. "We'll try to go after him. It's not your call to make, not mine – Phoenix, stop!"

One quick grab and the speaker was in her hand. Sydney tossed it into the gutter. She could hear Sloane's fear for her father in his voice, and even his regret – but he was constrained by the CIA, unable to work independently at this moment. Sydney had no such problems to hold her back.

The truck's doors slammed shut as its engine roared to life, and Sydney gasped as it began moving. There was no way she could skate fast enough to keep up. She turned and saw an electric blue Trans-Am barreling along the street, coming up behind, and she pushed herself into traffic just in time to grab the back. With the Trans-Am towing her, Sydney could lock her knees, hang onto the fin at the rear and keep her eyes on the truck. This was a temporary solution, but maybe it would give her time to think of something else.

Sparks flew from the wheels of her skates as they took a corner fast. Sydney's arms felt as though they would pull from their sockets, but she kept her grip.

Dad, hang on, I'm coming, this time I'm going to get to you, no matter what.

No matter what.

Luckily, the Trans-Am was headed in the same direction as Ware's truck – but Sydney realized to her horror that this was an on-ramp onto the highway that ran the length of Manhattan's west side. So late at night, traffic would be clear and either or both vehicles could be expected to accelerate faster than Sydney could possibly handle while hanging on. If she were flung from the Trans-Am in the middle of a highway, there would be no chance for her to roll to the curb; she was very likely to be run over within seconds.

But it was too late to let go. Sydney hung on tighter and hoped Rambaldi hadn't had this death in mind for her all along.

The Trans-Am's driver was either oblivious to his new passenger or determined to teach her a lesson. With a roar, the car sped up, zipping into the lane next to the truck and beginning to pull ahead of it. Sydney wanted to make a grab for the back bumper – a chain hanging from the doors looked promising – but the car was too quick. Before she could make her move, the vehicles were side by side. She could glimpse the face of the truck's driver in his rear-view mirror, and she realized that he could see her as well.

If he was inside the club, or if he describes me to Ware, they'll try to take me out, she realized. Funny how every situation had the potential to get worse.

The Trans-Am shifted back into its original lane, now directly ahead of Ware's truck. The truck's headlights shone on her so brightly she could hardly see, but she knew that the grille was getting closer. A lot closer. They were going to ram the Trans-Am in order to kill her.

What to do? What to do?

It's 1978. That means none of these guys has ever seen Raiders of the Lost Ark.

As the truck got closer, Sydney reached out for its front grille – then took hold of it, letting go of the Trans-Am. Quickly she grabbed the bumper and let the drag of the highway pull her skates, and most of her body, beneath the truck.

She had no time to lose; a ram now would break her hands and strand her to die for certain. Sydney began grabbing the tubing that hung beneath the truck, slithering along its underbelly. The hot metal singed her palms, but she could bear it for a few seconds. There were only inches between her face and the engine, and between her torso and the rough highway beneath. Uneven pavement jackhammered the wheels of her skates and jolted her body. Only by holding herself rigidly still and moving fast did she have any chance to survive.

Some bit of detritus on the highway snagged Sydney's blond wig, which yanked free so hard her entire scalp stung. She cried out, more from surprise than pain, but knew she wouldn't be heard over the engine's roar.

It had been a while since anything had scared Sydney this badly. But she remembered that her father was only inches away – needing her to save him, as he had needed her before. This time, she wouldn't fail.

Slipping through the wheels was terrifying, but once Sydney got beneath the trailer, she had considerably more room to move, and no more hot metal to deal with. She kept going, knowing that the hard part was still to come. When at last she got to the back of the trailer, she let her legs emerge from beneath the axle, took a deep breath, and grabbed for the back bumper. She got it.

Yes, Sydney thought. She hung on tight with one hand and reached for the chain she'd spied earlier. Cold steel swung into her palm, and then she was able to tow herself upright and swing one leg onto the bumper. It turned out the front brake of the roller skate was perfect for wedging between bumper and door, so hardly 30 seconds after she'd let go of the Trans-Am, Sydney was clinging to the back of the Mack truck's trailer, gasping for breath and trying to collect herself.

Her arms ached. Her hip joints weren't too happy either. How was she supposed to fight like this? She'd find a way.

Sydney had no weapon --- or did she? A quick study of the truck trailers' doors revealed that they were not locked, merely bolted shut with a long, thin rod. A long, thin, removable rod.

Her dark hair whipping all around her, Sydney took hold of the top of the rod with her free hand, sucked in one more deep breath and pulled it loose.

She kept her door from swinging open, but the other jostled loose almost immediately. One of Ware's henchmen appeared instantly, looking confused. Sydney saw only the first split second of astonishment on his face before she whacked him in the gut with the iron rod, then brought it down on the back of his head. The guy fell from the back with a shout; seconds later, horns behind them began honking and breaks squealing.

"What the hell?" That was Ware's voice. He grabbed Sydney's arm before she could get him with the rod.

Luckily that left him open to a quick knee to the groin.

As he staggered backward, Sydney dropped the rod and swung on the chain, arcing her body around the door and into the back of the truck at just the right angle to bring both her feet smashing into Ware's face. That was enough to take most guys down, most days, but now – while she wore eight pounds of roller skate – it flattened Ware into total unconsciousness. He fell as Sydney stumbled into the car, tripping over his inert body.

"What the hell?" shouted a big guy. Crap – a third man. Sydney tried to push herself to her feet, but the skates were a liability against the ridged floor, leaving her to scramble. The big guy grabbed a fistful of her satin jacket, and Sydney lifted her hands to ward the inevitable blow –

--when she heard a loud thud, and saw her assailant fall to the floor. Behind him, metal rod in hand, breathing hard, stood her father.

"Are you all right?" he said. Sydney could only gape at him.

Dad. He was here, alive, with her again. How many times had she wished for this, against all reason? For once, Rambaldi had given her something worth having.

Jack was different, so much so that it almost unnerved her. It wasn't his youth, nor even the clothes he wore – a white polyester suit with a black shirt, disco chic he'd never have worn for any purpose save espionage. It was the expression in his eyes as he looked at her. To him, she was a stranger now; he looked at her with only the impersonal concern he would give any helpful agent. In some ways, Sydney had never missed him as much as this moment, when she was reunited with him but not with his love for her.

"Is something wrong?" he said. Numbly she shook her head. Jack grimaced, as if that weren't the answer he wanted, but then Sydney saw the thin trickle of blood at his hairline. The blow or blows he'd taken to the head had left him dazed. "We – we have to get out of here."

"Okay." Her throat choked off the word, but Sydney forced herself to focus. "I'll handle it. Just hang on. Do you have any idea where they might be driving?"

"Probably Ware's place in the West 50s. Some abandoned theater – ideal for executions." His voice was as dry as ever.

The truck began to decelerate, and Sydney realized they were heading into a turn. "They're getting off the highway. We're going to have to get out of this thing. Let me take a look at where we are."

"Good. By the way – thanks."

"You don't have to thank me," Sydney said, knowing he could never realize how true those words were.

She pulled herself upright, mentally cursing the ribbed metal floor of the trailer that made skating so ungainly. As she pulled herself toward the back doors, Sydney glanced backward at her father again, unwilling to look away for long. The sight of him thinner and dark-haired awakened memories in Sydney so old she hadn't consciously thought of them in decades. She realized that she was responding to this Jack not as a fellow CIA agent or even as the stern, tough father she'd come to love in the last years of his life, but as Daddy.

If you don't get the two of you out of this before Ware's guys stop the truck, you'll have to watch him die again, Sydney reminded herself. And you are never, ever going to let it happen again. So get your shit together.

Peering from the back doors, Sydney saw that the drivers were taking them eastward on West 54th Street. Once, on spring break, she and Francie had taken a trip to New York complete with a sightseeing tour; that, plus Sydney's near-photographic memory, told her that they were almost where they needed to be. And now she knew exactly what they had to do.

"Right after we cross Eighth Avenue, we're going to make our move." Sydney held out her hand to her father. "Put your arms around me and hang on tight."

Still obviously stunned, Jack had to edge toward her by hanging onto the wall, but his grip around her waist was reassuringly strong. They had hugged so few times after she reached adulthood. She couldn't even let herself look at him.

If the truck would get caught by a stoplight, maybe she could try a simpler plan B – but no, they barreled through. At the right moment, Sydney clutched her father tightly with one hand, the chain from the back door in the other, and jumped. They swung out in a wide arc, over hordes of people massed on the sidewalk, who screamed and shouted –

-as Sydney and Jack landed on their feet in the middle of the crowds trying to get into Studio 54.

"Out of SIGHT!" somebody yelled as everyone began to applaud. Sydney grinned and hugged her father, who was cogent enough to lean the bloodied side of his head against her hair, where it wouldn't show. The bouncer behind the velvet rope nodded, satisfied that these two stood out from the crowd, and motioned them within.

Half a block up, Sydney could see Ware's truck – stopped dead in the middle of the road. Apparently they'd realized something was wrong. Soon they'd be looking for the people who had taken out their comrades.

Good thing Sydney and her father were about to duck into the most exclusive club in New York history, where almost nobody could get past the velvet rope. Ware's guys wouldn't be willing to attract the kind of attention they'd get by pulling guns on the bouncer. They were free and clear.

With Sydney skating and Jack leaning heavily against her, they entered the darkened entryway. Past them, she could see the dance floor, thick with brilliantly costumed dancers and hazy with smoke from cigarettes, joints and god knew what else. On the wall, an enormous neon crescent moon shoveled cocaine into its nose.

Sydney turned back to Jack. "We'll contact Sloane and let him know where to extract us."

"Sloane will have followed us. He'll be here within minutes, and he'll be furious." Jack tried to give her a sharp look, but ruined it with a wince. "You have to have disobeyed orders to come after me."

"I think people shouldn't argue with results. Are you sure you're okay?"

"Actually, I think I have a severe concussion."

"Is your vision affected? Your thinking?"

"Right now, I'm positive that I see David Bowie naked on the back of a horse being led by several costumed dwarves."

Sydney glanced behind her and sighed with relief. "It's okay. That's actually happening." When she looked back at her father, it was difficult to get the next words out: "You're all right. You're – you're going to be just fine."

She couldn't entirely keep the feeling from her voice, and she saw that Jack had registered her response. Before he could question it, though, Sydney heard a commotion at the front door. Ware's men? No, as predicted, Sloane had appeared – gun in hand, other agents behind him (silencing even the formidable bouncer) and a scowl on his face. Apparently he had no worries about causing too much attention.

"It's a raid!" someone shouted. People began to screech and scatter all around them, allowing joints and packets of white powder to fall, newly ownerless, to the floor. Sydney and Jack both ignored the bedlam as Sloane approached.

"Has the idea of a chain of command gone out of style in the 21st century, Phoenix?" Sloane put a hand on Jack's arm to steady him. "If you seriously believe that I would have allowed an operative – my friend – to come to harm, then you underestimated me. And you overstepped your bounds."

"You're not my superior officer." In any sense of the word, Sydney wanted to add.

"Wait." Jack seemed to have trouble taking this in, perhaps because of the cacophony around them, perhaps because of his injury. "This is the supposed time-traveler herself?" Apparently he'd been briefed.

Sloane smiled fondly. "You'll have to forgive Jack. He's a skeptic." His expression frosted as he turned his attention back to her. "What could have possessed you? To take off like that, risking your life, disobeying orders? I admit that it was an impressive display – extremely impressive, I admit – but you can't have realized that I –"

As Sloane continued his lecture, Sydney realized that Jack was staring at her. He might be asking himself why an operative would disobey orders and go to such extremes to rescue a stranger. He might be remembering how moved she had been by his rescue. He might be wondering why she looked so much like his wife.

He couldn't guess. He wouldn't. For Dad to believe in time-travel – it's just not possible.

Sydney knew her father would disregard whatever wild suspicion had briefly entered his mind. It would take a second, but he'd let it go. All she had to do was wait. Then, as he studied her, his eyes narrowed.

That one move – so small, so suspicious, so irreplaceably him – brought tears to Sydney's eyes faster than she could blink them away. And in that moment, Jack's face shifted into amazement. Her emotion had struck a spark, convincing him of something he would otherwise never have believed.

Sloane suddenly stopped talking, looking from Jack to Sydney in confusion. "What's going on?"

Jack whispered, "… Sydney?"

To hell with need to know. Sydney flung her arms around him. "Dad. Oh, Dad. It's me. It's Sydney."

As his arms hesitantly slipped around her, Sydney shut her eyes. The disco lights flashed red-gold against her eyelids, and hot tears slid down her cheeks. She didn't care how big a mistake it was; she was with her father again.

**

PART SIX

"You can't believe this bullshit story, Jack."

"I didn't say that I believed her." Sydney's father stood amid the agents who had been most suspicious of her throughout, dressed in a suit not so different from those he would wear later in life. "But we need to know why she wants me to believe her."

From the doorway of the restroom where she'd changed out of her alias, Sydney watched the discussion unfold. She wore her jeans again, and a Fair Isle sweater she wouldn't have been mortified to own in 2008. In a whimsical move, she had even tugged her hair back into a tight ponytail so that her Bristow ears would show. It didn't appear that this kind of proof was going to mean much to the assembled group.

"If she's pretending to be the child of an operative, that suggests she doubts our willingness to let her use the Ember and the Flame," Jack said. The stark overhead light amid the darkened warehouse haloed his hair so that it almost looked white. "Which in turn says that she truly believes in all this Rambaldi nonsense."

Bill Vaughn interjected, "All the more reason to confiscate the Flame now."

Sydney had handed the Ember over to Sloane when he'd demanded it in Studio 54. She suspected at the time that he'd only done it as a show of the authority she'd subverted in her rescue attempt, more for the sake of the others than for himself. But Sloane had mysteriously failed to appear in the warehouse with the others.

Jack nodded. "I'll have a talk with Phoenix, convince her to hand over the Flame. Spend a little time alone with her. I can play it so that she has to give the Rambaldi artifact to me in order to sustain the illusion that she's my daughter."

"Sounds like a plan," Bill said.

Softly, Sydney shut the bathroom door; as she heard Jack's steps come closer, she opened the door again, making sure the knob's tumblers rattled and the hinges squeaked. "There you are," she said. "I was starting to wonder."

"Hello, sweetheart." Jack's smile was the too-easy kind reserved for public pretense. "I guess we've got a lot to talk about."

"Yeah, we do."

Jack offered her his arm, which she took, and they began strolling toward one of the warehouse's back rooms. Sydney pretended she couldn't feel the eyes of the others on them as they went.

Jack began, "Why didn't you explain who you were from the beginning?"

"The less information I gave out, the better."

"They might have handled things differently, knowing that you were the daughter of a colleague."

"Nobody's mistreated me." Though in Bill Vaughn's case, that might be only because he hasn't had the chance. "I didn't think I needed to use you to bargain."

"Of course not." Jack's grip did not shift into the reassuring squeeze most people would've given. They stepped through the doorway into the backroom, and instantly his demeanor changed. He dropped her arm; his expression was all business. "Quiet. Follow me."

They ran through the room toward another door, one that led to an outside staircase. Sydney followed her father down, going as fast as they could without clomping on the steps.

Jack murmured, "The others don't trust you."

"I overheard. I realized before that anyway."

Her father glanced up at her, his eyes uncertain. "What I said about manipulating you –"

"You were manipulating them instead. I realized that too."

"How could you be sure?"

They'd reached the bottom of the steps, which led only to a half-empty parking lot. Sydney didn't know what came next. But she smiled at her father. "You're my dad. I know you."

He smiled back – and this time it was the hesitant little smile that she knew was real.

"You must have run a game theory analysis," Sydney said. "Realized that I had nothing to gain by pretending to be your daughter."

"I would have if I'd needed to. I didn't." Jack looked as if he couldn't explain that, but he didn't have to. Sydney sometimes thought she knew him better than he knew himself.

A car came roaring into the lot and skidded to a stop right next to them; when Jack leaped into the back seat, Sydney followed suit. As she slammed the door shut, the car sped back into the streets so fast that the tires squealed. "They will have heard that,' Jack said.

"If you're displeased, Jack, next time you can drive the getaway car," Sloane said, never taking his eyes off the road.

Sydney found she wasn't that surprised. This was the friendship they'd had, once. No wonder her father never stopped letting Sloane get under his skin. "Are you guys going to get in trouble for this?"

"I doubt it," Sloane said. "When you return to 2008, all knowledge of your time here will be erased. Therefore, so will their knowledge of our removing you from CIA custody."

Jack frowned. "Will we go back to where we were before, with me undercover in Ware's group? Or will we merely believe in some alternate sequence events that brings us to our new location?"

"The records aren't that clear. Someday, maybe, Sydney can go through the old files and find out."

"What next?" Sydney asked.

Jack didn't seem to know what to say. "I suppose there's no further reason for delay. As long as Arvin has the Ember –"

"—which I do—"

"—then there's no reason not to send you back to your own time, assuming that the Rambaldi devices actually work as you two believe they do. The longer you remain in 1978, the greater the chances that other parties within the CIA or among Rambaldi's followers will attempt to stop you." Jack paused. "I wish – if we could – but your safety is more important than anything else."

Sydney knew her father was being logical and sensible, but she didn't want to be logical right now. She'd traveled through time to reunite with her dead father, and now she was supposed to just – wave goodbye and go?

Sloane said, "I don't believe in coincidences."

"I don't follow," Jack said. Sydney frowned.

"To believe in coincidences is to believe that events have no meaning," Sloane continued. His hands remained sure on the wheel. "I've never subscribed to that theory. Jack, of all the people in the world to have the Ember – Ware? The person you were assigned to tail? Doesn't that strike you as extraordinary?"

"All of this strikes me as extraordinary," Jack said. "But I see your point."

Sloane continued, "Sydney, you've come 30 years through time and across a continent, straight to your father. Whatever deeper purpose the Flame has, whatever reason Rambaldi had for sending you on this journey – it has to be connected to your father. Maybe to your mother as well."

"Mom?" Sydney was startled by Sloane bringing her up.

"I think there's no further point in being coy. Obviously, as informed about Rambaldi as you are, you're aware that your mother's something of an armchair historian in this area. She's the one who told Jack and me about Milo Rambaldi in the first place."

Sydney glanced at her father, who nodded. How weird, to think about her father hearing about Rambaldi for all those years, surrounded by the two biggest believers, and never to have believed in it himself. And yet, when she thought about it, how obvious.

"I know about Mom's interest in Rambaldi," she admitted. "Maybe – maybe she's the only one who could ever explain."

Jack spoke to Sloane. "You want to drive to D.C., tonight. You'd put Sydney and Laura at risk for this?"

"Be reasonable, Jack. They'd expect us to head for a remote location; the last place they'd ever think of looking for us is at your own house. We can make the drive within three and a half hours."

"Wait." Sydney gripped the door handle, as if her body wanted to fling itself out of the car to protect her from all of this. "We're going to see Mom? Tonight?"

Her father turned to her. "It's your choice. It would be safer for you to use the Flame and Ember immediately. That's what I would personally prefer, but – Rambaldi means little to me. If you need answers, we'll go." He sighed. "And somehow explain this to your mother."

"Would she be able to believe this?" Sloane said. "Your daughter from the future – it's a lot to take in."

Jack nodded slowly. "Somehow I think she will." He glanced sidelong at Sydney. "Your mother's ability to deal with the unexpected is extraordinary. If this doesn't shake her, nothing will."

"I know," Sydney said, wondering how her father could understand her mother so well and yet not at all.

The highway signs suggested that they were at the moment of reckoning. Sloane said, "Do we need to pull over for you to think about it, Sydney? I realize it's a big decision."

"I don't need more time." Sydney needed answers – not the answers Sloane was referring to, but he never had to know that. And she couldn't yet bring herself to tell her father goodbye. "Let's go home."

**

During the four hours in the car, Sydney talked to Jack and Sloane mostly about the miraculous changes in the past 30 years; as always, her father was more comfortable discussing facts rather than feelings, and Sloane seemed to understand that. Sydney, who had spent much of the previous two-and-a-half years wishing for even five more seconds with her dad, would've been happy even if they'd been forced to sit together in silence.

"It can't be as simple as that," Jack insisted. "The Soviet Union wouldn't simply – disband."

"Winter 1989," Sidney said. "Not long after the reunification of Germany and Nelson Mandela's release from prison."

"Winter 1989." Sloane wore a small smile as he drove through the night. "I wish I could know to look forward to it."

That would've been about the time the Alliance was formed. Sydney glanced out the window to hide her expression. All the beginnings and endings and betrayals to come seemed to fill the space around her.

She reminded herself, You can't go back to where it all began without remembering how it's all going to end.

Only once did Jack venture into the personal. While Sloane filled the gas tank (at 71 cents a gallon), they were left alone in the car. They smiled at one another, almost timidly. Sydney could tell her father very much wanted to speak but was reluctant to – it was an expression she'd learned to interpret over the years. "What is it, Dad?"

"Sometimes – the demands of this job –" Jack stopped and started again. "Sydney, am I going to be a good father to you?"

"What?"

He held himself very still. "Was I home enough? Do we have a good relationship? Sometimes I'm afraid you'll hardly know me. "

The words came to her instantly. "You were great. You came to every piano recital, every game." Maybe that was too much. "Okay, not every single one, but always when it was important. You're going to be a wonderful dad."

Sydney thought she had never really understood how her father could lie to her so often and believe it to be an act of love. Now she got it.

"Good," Jack said. "That's very good to know." His whole posture changed, the set of his face – reflecting a relief so deep that it nearly made Sydney cry. He'd meant to do so much better.

Just for the night, she decided to pretend that he had; it was too good a lie to waste on only one of them.

**

They reached Falls Church, Virginia, in the wee hours of the morning. Because phoning might have tipped off the CIA to their plans, they had had no chance to tell Sydney's mother anything about this. Jack went in without them, to wake his wife and tell her that their adult daughter was visiting from the future. It wasn't a task Sydney envied him – even if she knew, as he could not, how readily Irina Derevko would believe the story.

In the meantime, Sydney and Sloane sat in the car, waiting.

"You ought to have told me," he said fondly. "I saw you on the day you were born, you know."

"I didn't know that, actually."

"Then we haven't gotten together to tell old stories nearly often enough."

"Maybe so."

"My wife – Emily, I suppose you know her –"

"Yes." I did.

"—how she adores you. We must have spent a great deal of time apart – a career in espionage does that – but surely we're good friends, still. I can't believe you managed to hide it from me. Clever girl."

It was just too much to bear.

"The Ember." Sydney held out her hand. "Give it to me."

Sloane handed it over, but his gaze followed the device wistfully. Observed closely, the Ember had the same kind of steampunk charm as most of Rambaldi's devices: brass and copper grids interwoven into a padlock, thick with curlicues and somehow evocative of a map. An atlas to the future, Sydney supposed.

"Thanks," Sydney said shortly.

Sloane turned around in the car to face her. "Wait. Why do you say it like that?"

"Because –" The word choked in her throat.

"Sydney. Whatever else we've become by 2008, I feel sure we're still good friends. Can't you tell me what's troubling you?"

That was what broke her. He wanted to know what the trouble was? Then she'd tell him.

"Friends? We aren't friends. You haven't been anybody's friend in a very long time."

"What are you talking about?"

"You'll stop caring about other human beings. You'll become a Rambaldi follower. You'll become his most devout follower of all. You'll put together the largest collection of his devices in the world, and you won't care if you have to lie or cheat or steal or kill to get them."

"I wouldn't –"

"You will," Sydney insisted. "I know because I saw you. Sometimes I helped you, before I understood what it was I was doing."

Sloane's profile was stark as the nearby streetlamp cast his face in harsh shadows. "If this is something we do for the CIA – and it has to be – then I want to believe it's for the right reasons."

"You ditch the CIA before the 1980s have ended. You start up your own criminal organization, and you recruit people who believe they're serving their country but are really helping you buy weapons, and commit assassinations, and torture people all for your own profit. I was one of the lucky recruits. You wanted to use me as a hostage for my father's good behavior – that's what you turn into. A man who would put his best friend's daughter in danger just to get his way."

"You're lying," Sloane said in that too-certain voice that meant he was anything but sure.

"What reason would I have to lie? I'm erasing your memory of this within the hour. Me – I have to live with what you've done forever." Sydney took a deep breath. Could she really tell him all of it? Yes, she could. "Someday you're going to kill my father in front of my eyes. I see that every night when I try to sleep."

For the first time, it occurred to her that this image would no longer be her last memory of her father. Maybe she could replace it with something better. But at the moment – sharing a car with her father's murderer – it was small comfort.

"Dear God." Sloane looked stricken. She knew he believed her.

"I trusted you," Sydney said. "I liked you. My father must have loved you. In the end, you'll love Rambaldi more than all of us. More than anything else." The quiver of pain in her voice startled her. For years she'd thought only of how angry Sloane's betrayal had made her. This was the first time she'd admitted to herself how badly it had hurt.

Sloane was visibly weakened by shock and horror, and Sydney could see his hand shaking as he rested it on the roof of his car to steady himself. "And I can change nothing."

"No."

The door of her childhood home opened, and silhouetted there were her father and – yes, her mother.

Sydney pushed the Ember into her jeans pocket and got out of the car. As she walked across the driveway, she glanced at Sloane's face; despite the darkness, she thought she could make out the sheen of tears on his face.

Good, she thought. Let him feel it just for once. Yet she felt guilty all the same, and for the first time in many years, she missed the good man Arvin Sloane had once been.

The emotion only lasted a moment, however, because Sydney couldn't think about Sloane much longer. Her mother was waiting.

**

"I still can't believe it," her mother repeated.

Jack and Irina sat side-by-side on the sofa, with Sydney in the nearest chair. As astonishingly beautiful as Irina had been at the end of her life, she was even more stunning now – a girl in her 20s, wearing a soft pink nightgown and robe. Sydney couldn't get over the strangeness of looking at her parents so youthful, and without any of the bitterness she'd come to associate with their partnership; Jack's arm was around his wife's shoulders, and almost unconsciously, Irina seemed to be leaning on him in her astonishment.

Her eyes were wary, and Sydney thought she understood why.

"I'm sorry if this is shocking for you," Sydney said. "I know it has to be."

"I only wish I had more to tell you." Irina brushed her feathered hair away from her forehead, tucking a lock behind her ear in a gesture so familiar it made Sydney's throat tighten. "The Flame and Ember are mysterious. There's not much known about them. Obviously they're among Rambaldi's most powerful creatures, but the purpose behind them – even now, I don't know."

"Maybe it'll become clear after I return to 2008."

"Maybe so." Irina nodded.

Jack smiled slightly. "You'll have to tell us about this then, you know. See if we believe you."

Sydney tensed but managed to hide her reaction. "Yeah," she managed to say.

The nearby clock told Sydney that it was after 2 a.m. Somewhere, upstairs, her three-year-old self was tucked into her bed, maybe with Teddy under her arm. They'd moved to L.A. when she was too young to really remember this house, but everything about it comforted her on a deep level: the scent of bread and cinnamon, the one soft halo of light from the table lamp, even the ticking of the clock.

She said, "If the only purpose behind this trip is – well, seeing you two again -- I guess I should tell you who I am now. I mean, who I've become, as an adult."

"A CIA agent, your father said." Irina stared just past her daughter – that searching gaze that could hide so much. Usually Sydney had seen it through the glass wall of a cell.

"I love the work," Sydney admitted – and it felt more like an admission to herself than to her parents. "I don't think I'll stay in forever, but I'm not nearly to give it up yet. When I do, I think I might go back and get my doctorate so I can teach. Literature," she added.

Jack gazed at his wife. "Just like your mother."

Sydney and Irina's eyes met. The terror of discovery was all but visible on Irina's face now; Sydney knew the extremes it took for her mother to even hint at losing control. All Irina could think about, Sydney realized, was whether or not she was about to be exposed.

For the very last time, Sydney decided to let her mother off the hook.

"Just like Mom," Sydney said, and she smiled. Irina relaxed slightly, and Sydney knew she'd made the right choice. "I'm married to a fellow agent. He's a good man. You'll see." Of course, Dad will spend years disapproving of Vaughn, but we'll get to that soon enough. "And we have one child so far, a little girl named Isabelle."

"Grandparents," Irina whispered. "We'll have a grandchild." She turned to her husband, as if unable to believe the bonds that would still hold them together.

"I wish we could know what to look forward to," Jack said. "Seeing you so – grown-up, and beautiful, and strong – I want to remember this."

Irina shook her head. "It doesn't work that way. I know that much about the Flame, at least."

From upstairs, a small voice called, "Daddy?"

Oh, my God – that's me.

Sydney straightened, unsure how to react; the sound of her own childish words made her feel panicky and weird in ways she couldn't explain. But nobody seemed to need an explanation. Jack rose to his feet. "I haven't been home in a while. I'll go up, get Sydney – you – get my daughter back to sleep. You two can talk."

He went up the stairs, and it seemed to Sydney that she could remember being at the top of the steps even as she watched from the bottom. Maybe it was this night, but probably it was any number of other nights: Her tiny self in footie pajamas, clutching her teddy bear in drowsy wonder as she saw her daddy finally coming home. Even the creaking of the stairs beneath his feet awakened a deep tide of feeling inside her, and it was all Sydney could do to maintain her composure as he went.

"We should, you know," Irina said. "Talk, I mean."

"Yeah, I guess we should." Sydney took a steadying breath. "I know what you want to ask. Go ahead and do it."

Her mother never had been the type to ask many questions. "You know the truth about me."

"Dad managed to keep it from me until I was an adult, but I know now."

"Sydney, I ask you to believe only two things. First, that what I've done was for my country – and that means no less to me than your country does to you." Irina faltered, only for a moment, but any hesitation from her was extraordinary. "Second – that I love you so very much."

"I believe you," Sydney said. "But I want you to believe me, too. The U.S.S.R. is going to collapse in a little more than a decade. What you're doing to him, to me, in the name of your country – it was all for nothing."

If Irina had doubted Sydney before, she didn't anymore. Her eyes were wide and dark.

"I'm not going to tell Dad tonight," Sydney said. "It would only hurt him. And he's going to get hurt enough as it is."

"This could be a trick," Irina said. "A lie about the Soviet Union, to make me abandon my duty."

"It isn't a trick. By the way, you didn't get Rambaldi's power either." She had not come here to confront her mother with this, but now the words spilled out. "The thing is, Mom, even after you betrayed us, I still loved you. Dad still loved you."

"That's impossible," Irina whispered. "He only loves what he thinks he sees."

"He loves you," Sydney insisted. "I love you. And you love me." She swallowed hard. "It seems like all that love ought to change something, doesn't it? Like it ought to matter. But it didn't matter in the end, not to you."

Irina rose from the sofa. Sydney was almost frightened of what she would do, but her mother only ran quietly toward the stairs. Within a few seconds, her father reappeared.

"Your mother said she was going to relieve me," he whispered. "But I could see – she was upset. I suppose it's natural to be overcome at a moment like this." Jack was apologizing for his own behavior, not his wife's.

"You don't show your feelings," Sydney said. "I know that. You don't have to pretend."

"She'll come back in a few minutes."

"No. I should go. I've said goodbye to her, and –" This was going to be even harder than she'd thought. "Now I have to say goodbye to you."

Jack studied her for a few moments. "We've died," he said. "In the future."

Sydney wanted to deny it, but instead she nodded.

"The way you looked at me when we first saw each other – you looked so sad. Once I realized who you were, I suspected there was only one reason for that reaction."

"I shouldn't have let you see –"

"This isn't a mission. You don't have to apologize." Jack took a deep breath. "Both of us?"

Sydney nodded again. She wished her mother hadn't taken the tissue.

"Just tell me –" What was he going to ask? Sydney didn't know what she feared, only that his question surprised her: "Which one of us died first?"

Technically, she didn't know the answer. "You died on the same day."

He frowned. "A car accident?"

She couldn't explain. She wouldn't. "Yes. A car accident. Just a couple of years ago. You died together."

To her astonishment, Jack sighed in evident relief. Apparently registering her surprise, he said, "Obviously, I'd rather hear that we were alive and well. Spoiling our granddaughter. But – this job – I always worried about leaving your mother alone. And I know I never wanted to live without her."

Sydney rose from her chair and flung her arms around her father. This time, when he hugged her back, there was no hesitation, no awkwardness.

"I don't know how to let you go," Sydney said as a tear spilled down her cheek. "I know I have to say goodbye, but I don't know if I can do it, knowing that – that we're never going to see each other again."

For a few seconds, Jack simply held her. Then he said, "We'll see each other again."

Sydney looked up at him in confusion.

He gave her that small, familiar smile. "After you walk outside, I'm going to go back upstairs. I'll look into your room. You'll be up there, fast asleep. And I'll be here when you wake up in the morning."

It will all happen again, Sydney realized. It's not a line. It's a circle.

"Thank you," she whispered. "I love you."

"I love you too, sweetheart."

Jack kissed her once on the forehead. As he smiled down at her, Sydney knew she had another memory to think of before she fell asleep.

She broke the embrace reluctantly, but her father let her go. Then she took the Flame from around her neck and the Ember from her pocket, clicked the two together and gave the Flame a twist.

The floor fell out from under her as she was lost in a sudden wash of brilliant light. Sydney pushed herself up, gasping, as she tried to get her bearings.

She was once again in Ruiz's lab – this time, surrounded by clipped-on work lights that had been set up in the hallways. Sydney glanced around for Sloane – for Rachel, whoever – and saw nobody. As she stumbled to her feet, she clutched the Flame and Ember more tightly. If this had gone wrong somehow, she wanted another chance at setting things right.

But they crumbled instantly in her hands, changing from amber and metal to so much glittering dust. Sydney watched the last specks blow from her palm and took a deep, shuddering breath.

Please let me be back home, she thought. All I need is to get back home.

A quick brush over her clothing suggested she was wearing the same kind of clothes as she had been when the Flame had taken her back in time. Sydney couldn't be positive these were the same jeans and T-shirt, but they certainly seemed to be similar. Moving quietly, she made her way past the sphere of the work lights into the hall that led outside. There were other signs of an ongoing search – taped-off doorways, sprays of bluish fingerprint power on handles – but nobody else in sight.

Then Sydney heard footsteps from within one room.

Glancing around, she saw no potential weapons save for a bit of broken brick at her feet. She grabbed it and braced herself – but it was Dixon who emerged.

"Syd!" His face lit up. "Thank God we found you."

"Dixon." Sydney felt almost weak with relief. She let the brick drop. "How long was I missing?"

"Just over two days." Exactly the amount of time she'd been in 1978. "It was like you'd vanished into thin air. We went over the Rambaldi artifacts – there was one wild theory –"

"That I went backward in time? It really happened."

Dixon gaped at her in amazement, but a small smile soon dawned on his face. "This is going to be one of the fun debriefs, isn't it?"

Sydney thought about how their faces would look when she described her roller-disco adventures. "Most definitely."

After signaling to the nearby teams that they'd found her, Dixon walked Sydney out of the building. A few trucks were sitting around, and in the distance she saw Marshall with some sort of next-generation sensor device, waving cheerfully at her. She waved back with a grin. For a moment she hoped Vaughn would be part of the team, but he wasn't. Of course: He would be with Isabelle, at home. It would feel so good to come home again.

"You get to ride in the good car," Dixon said, motioning toward the only non-cargo truck in the group. "Talk to you in L.A."

"See you." Sydney opened the door, slid into the backseat and stared at her traveling companion, Arvin Sloane.

At first she couldn't think, couldn't breathe. She shut the door behind them on autopilot, not even recognizing that she was completing the movement. Sloane – stylish as ever in a black suit and tie – spoke to the driver first. "Let's get going." His finger flicked onto the switch that raised a soundproof barrier between front and back seats.

"Oh, my God." Sydney wished she hadn't let go of that brick. "You escaped."

"Sydney, we have a great deal to discuss. It's important that you listen."

"I will kill you, you son of a bitch, don't think I can't –" But he was immortal; how could she kill anyone immortal? Well, she could hurt him and she was by God going to start right now.

"Sydney! Please. Hear me out." Sloane took a deep breath and plunged ahead. "I have to tell you many things, but first of all, before anything, I have to apologize for the sins of a man I never became."

"You aren't making any sense." Sydney was ready to jump from the moving car, if necessary.

"You warned me of the danger – of what Rambaldi would do to me. And I listened to you."

He remembers. But wasn't that impossible? "Tell me what you're talking about."

"You visited 1978 by using the Flame," Sloane said. "You thought you understood how it worked, but there was one loophole you didn't realize. Anybody who physically touched the Flame or the Ember during the time surrounding your visit would retain their memories, even after you went back."

Sloane, Sydney thought. And Bill Vaughn. "You've known about the future all this time."

"As has your mother."

"Mom? That's impossible. She never touched the Flame or the Ember."

"Apparently she was the one who traded the Ember to Ware in the first place – a token for your father's safety. Even when she was lying to him, she was already devoted to him, whether she'd admitted it to herself or not."

Sydney flattened her hands against the seat, as if trying to steady herself. "How can you possibly know that?"

"In early 1979, your mother confessed to your father that she was secretly an operative of the KGB," Sloane said. "He convinced her to turn herself in to the CIA. Irina Derevko – her real name, I don't know if you knew that – she was imprisoned for a year and kept under surveillance for longer. Eventually, however, she became a fine CIA operative in her own right. Somehow, the marriage survived." He studied Sydney carefully. "I take it matters didn't go so well the first time?"

"That's putting it lightly." Sydney wasn't sure she could believe any of it. "If that's true, where are my parents? Why didn't they come to find me themselves?"

"They sent me, Sydney. Their most trusted friend. I realize it may require some time for you to believe me, but I took what you said to heart. I've never sought Rambaldi's work for my own gain or gone against the CIA. And I have done my best to be a good friend to your father and your family." Sloane's smile was uneven, but somehow Sydney believed it was sincere. "I look forward to regaining your trust. I only regret I once failed to deserve it, and – I thank you for giving me the warning I needed."

"And Dad?" Sydney's voice cracked. "Dad is okay?"

Sloane nodded. "He's waiting for you in Los Angeles."

It was too much to take in. Sydney started to sob, hard racking sobs she hadn't cried since her father's funeral. Sloane tried to pat her on the shoulder, but she held up a hand to ward him off. Even if she could possibly believe this – and she wasn't sure she could, not until she saw her parents with her own eyes – it would take her a long time to accept Sloane again.

After the near half-hour it took her to collect herself, Sloane said, "Your mother and I admitted to each other years ago that we remembered your journey back in time. We've never told Jack about the betrayals in the other timeline, nor the reasons behind our changes of heart. If you want to tell him, it's your decision." More quietly he added, "We would understand."

"My father believes in a person's right not to know," Sydney said. Lying as love, indeed. "But if I ever suspect either of you, for even one second of one day, I'll tell him everything and make sure he never trusts you two again as long as you live."

"I believe you." They rode on in silence for a few moments before Sloane added, "There is one difficult matter we should discuss right now. Your father knows all the details; you're the one who needs to understand the change between the reality you knew and this one."

Sydney didn't like the sound of this. "Tell me."

Sloane cleared his throat. He looked more uncertain than Sydney had ever seen him before. "Your mother's first long-term undercover assignment – for the CIA, I mean – was in 1981. I was her partner. Our aliases were as lovers, and at one point – to complete the illusion – matters became complicated."

Why would he be telling me this? Oh, GOD. "You mean – Nadia. She's here?"

"How could you possibly have known Nadia?" Sloane said, apparently genuinely startled.

"Do you want the answer to that question?"

After a moment, Sloane glanced away, ashamed. "No."

To her shock, Sydney realized she could remember Nadia as a child; the memory was softer and less distinct than her real childhood memory (what was "real," anymore?), but it was there. Nadia as a baby in her crib, looking up at her big sister with wide, dark eyes. Nadia on a tricycle in the back yard.

Nadia at her high school graduation, wearing a white cap and gown, hugging first Sloane, then Irina, then Jack.

"It wasn't an affair," Sloane said. "It wasn't even a loss of control. It was purely part of the illusion we had to create. Your father accepted that and forgave us. It took time, but he was able to understand. I only hope you can do the same."

"I want to see my sister," Sydney demanded. "Is she in L.A. too?"

Sloane nodded. "There's only one more thing –"

"I doubt that."

"Sydney, you said that you had come from the year 2008. It's only 2004."

"What?"

"Do you have any idea what that could mean, or why you would only travel part of the way back?"

Sydney shook her head. Information overload had left her reeling, and her sense of disorientation only became more powerful as she realized Isabelle would not be waiting for her at home; her daughter had not yet been born. "Where's Vaughn?"

Sloane frowned. "Who's Vaughn?"

No. Oh, God, no.

As Sydney sucked in a horrified breath, Sloane said, "Ah, you must mean Bill Vaughn. He left the CIA only days after your departure for – well, for now. It turned out he was a Rambaldi follower named Michaux – but you knew that, didn't you?"

No meetings in the basement. No clandestinely exchanged Christmas gifts. No rendezvous in the train station. No first kiss in the ruins of SD-6. No Isabelle.

A voice in Sydney's head that didn't seem like her own said, Did you think all this would be free?

She started to sob again, and this time Sloane mercifully let her grieve in silence.

**

By the time they reached Los Angeles, Sydney had calmed herself, but she felt worn out, almost incapable. Her grief for her lost husband and child was numbed by shock.

She half-sleepwalked into the CIA – not APO, not SD-6, just the main office – and clicked her ID tag against the sensors. It was a different photo in this reality, yet just as hideous. Figures, Sydney thought.

Then she heard someone say, "You're back!"

Sydney lifted her head to see Nadia. She wore the same kind of suit she'd always favored, but now had a flippy, layered haircut. Her voice held no hint of an Argentinean accent. Not the same – but the same. Still her sister, alive and well.

"I'm so glad you got back early," Nadia said. "Will wants us all to go to the movies tonight. 'The Third Man' – it's amazing. You have to see it."

"Nadia?" Sydney whispered. "Oh, my God. Come here."

She flung her arms around her sister; Nadia returned the hug, though obviously puzzled. "Sydney, did you have a rough mission?"

"Pretty rough. Can we talk later? I'm going to need it."

"Of course. Are you also going to need tequila?"

Sydney half-sobbed, half-laughed into her sister's hair. "Most definitely."

Sloane, who had been standing politely to one side during this, cleared his throat. "We have a meeting in a few seconds, everyone. Debrief can wait. Tequila can certainly wait."

"Okay, Dad," Nadia sighed. She put an arm around Sydney's shoulders. "Let's get in there."

They walked into the ops center, where everyone was milling around, talking and checking their terminals as always. The last time Sydney had been there, it had been carbon-scored from explosives set by Lauren Reed. It felt comforting to see it in one piece.

Then she heard two familiar voices:

"I'll never teach you to think outside the box, will I, Jack?"

"You'll manage it around the same time I teach you to use a safety net."

Sydney whirled to see her parents walking into the ops center side-by-side. Her father looked the same as ever, though he seemed younger than she remembered him being, by far; the flinty, armored expression he'd always worn was softened somewhat, and his movements were more easy than stiff. Her mother wore a tailored skirt and white shirt with high-heeled pumps, an outfit on the good side of the border between sexy and professional. Her hair was tucked into a twist that should have made her look demure, but did not. They were smiling at each other, which was stranger than all the rest. "Dad? Mom?"

"Sweetheart." Jack gave her a quick hug, casually, as though he did this often. "You're back. Did you destroy the Rambaldi artifact?"

"It – it fell apart in my hands," Sydney stammered.

"Did it work the way Arvin theorized?" When Sydney nodded mutely, Jack rested a hand on her shoulder. "You're shaken up. Small wonder. We can go over this later."

Irina looked at her daughter, obviously uncertain. "Hello, Sydney."

Sydney took in the sight of her mother, who was wearing an ID tag with a name she'd never seen before: IRINA BRISTOW. She took a deep breath and said, "Hi."

Her mother took a halting step forward, then slipped her arms around Sydney. Probably they hugged often in this reality, but Irina knew, as nobody else in the room could, that Sydney remembered the betrayals better than any of the rest.

But the betrayals had been committed by another Irina – a woman this Irina had never turned into. The person here was her father's wife. A loyal CIA agent. Mom.

Sydney returned the hug, awkwardly but tightly. She felt the tension flow from Irina's body as she evidently realized that her secrets remained safe.

"Hey, guys," Weiss said as he strolled into the ops center, file folders under one arm. "We have a briefing around now, right?"

"We have a briefing in precisely two minutes, Mr. Weiss," Jack said. "As you should know."

"Good," Sydney said. "A briefing. Let's go." Her parents exchanged worried looks, but Sydney said, "I need to work. Something to think about. I'll explain later. Okay?"

"All right." Jack hesitated no longer. "Let's get started."

As everyone began to file from the ops center, Irina fell into step behind her daughter. "I understand," she said.

"That I'm keeping the secret?" Sydney asked.

Irina shook her head, dismissive of her personal secrecy in a way Sydney had never glimpsed before. "You've lost as much as you gained. If you need to talk – I'm here."

Of course – she'd told her mother about being married and having a child. Now Irina was the only other person in the world with any memory, however faint, of Isabelle. That more than anything else lowered the barriers between them, and Sydney found herself clutching her mother's arm for support.

She leaned on her mother slightly as they went into the meeting room. It all looked so ordinary, even comforting: Marshall excitedly explaining something to Dixon, Weiss giving Nadia a bashful grin as they took their seats. Her parents went to the front of the room, and the shadow memory inside her mind reminded her that they co-led this task force. Everything was so right, and yet so terribly wrong.

Then Jack punched a toggle that brought up a screen with the image of the man they were pursuing, and Sydney's eyes widened.

"This is Andre Michaux," Jack said. Vaughn's face stared back at them, defiant and somewhat harder than Sydney had ever known him to be. His hair was shaggy, longer than he had worn it before, but there was still the same look in his eyes – the decency that made her believe in him no matter what. "He's the son of a Rambaldi follower who, for years, infiltrated the CIA under the name Bill Vaughn."

"This guy is the enemy operative we're after?" Weiss asked, completely unaware that this man was, in another lifetime, his best friend.

Irina shook her head. "Reports indicate that the younger Mr. Michaux doesn't approve of his father's methods. He's branched out on his own, apparently in an effort to go straight. With persuasion, he might be willing to share what he knows with us."

This is why it's 2004, Sydney realized. Rambaldi's prophecies foretold all of us; no matter what else happens, we all have to come to be. Me. Nadia. Isabelle. The timeline found a way to create Nadia despite all the changes – it's trying to help me too. The Rambaldi device brought me forward to a time where I could still find Vaughn and have our child.

I can get him back. I can get Isabelle back.

There was no guaranteeing that Vaughn would love her this time, or that they could ever have a life on the right side of the law; this man would have grown up a criminal, and under the influence of a father she profoundly distrusted. But she could try. At least she had a chance to fight for the life she'd really wanted all along.

Jack's voice broke into her reverie. "We're putting together a team to reach out to Michaux. Weiss, Nadia, I'd like you two to take the lead on this."

"No," Sydney interrupted. "I need to go."

Irina frowned. "Your last mission was difficult. If you want more time –"

"We'll have time for debrief later," Sydney promised. She stared at Vaughn's illuminated image on the wall and felt a broad smile spread across her face. "This one's mine."

THE END