The Perfect Weapon: Chapter 2015: Parts 3 and 4

[camillecarelli]

Chapter 2015: Part 3

Weiss paced back and forth before stopping to peer into the small slitted opening that passed for a window. Sloane was groaning and feeling the wall behind his head. What the hell had Irina been planning to do with this room, he wondered? "Cure her husband’s claustrophobia?" He chuckled as he began to imagine Irina and Dr. Barnett’s session on that idea and then "Umph!" He grunted and fell face down onto the floor in a boneless heap, unable to rouse when rough hands searched for and located the key.

She took a gasping breath and began to cough. A second later, she panicked, pushing at the folds of the burka, feeling suffocated. Struggling to sit up, caught in the fabric, she fell over once, then forced herself to her feet, hearing the sound of ripping fabric in the unnatural silence around her. Buried, she felt buried, she decided, frantically pushing the covering over her face and taking deep breaths of free air. Free...It felt fetid. She coughed again and looked around in the darkness and saw only the echo of a faint grey light far away. Bloody hell, she realized. She was in a bloody cave! Dave would... Oh no. She felt her way carefully, keeping her eyes on the light, hoping it was not misleading her.

Dave and Sark dismounted from their horses, Sark quickly, Dave a little more slowly. Sark pointed at the ground where it turned to a mix of smooth and jagged rock. "Here is where it ends. It appears that she was dragged for a while..."

"Please tell me that those aren’t caves below the cliff," Dave muttered, picking his way across the rocks. He looked down. "Well, damn."

"Excellent hiding..." Sark trailed off at the look Dave sent him. "I do believe I’ll refrain from-"

"Shut your mouth, Juli and use plain English," Dave snapped. He shook his head. "Sorry. Sorry. I didn’t-"

"I’m not a child," Sark reminded him. "I - as the American say so pithily - get it. I’ll go down and look for her. If you trust me, that is."

Dave shrugged. "I trust you, I just... We need to call into Jack and Irina and let them know that if her abductor stole her to bring Sloane to her, then we can set a trap for him here."

Vaughn raced back to Weiss. "Eric--" He swore as he saw his friend unconscious on the ground. He bent over to check his pulse and felt warm wetness on his hand. Blood. "Damn it!" He looked up at the open door to the cell-like room. Empty. Grabbing his com unit, he spoke into it. "Prisoner has escaped. Repeat-- prisoner has escaped."

Irina ran back into the guards' room and gestured impatiently. "Get up on the roof and find our unwanted guest."
"He can't have gone far. We should take the horses--" Sydney suggested.

"Damn it!" Jack grunted as they ran for the stables.

Sydney said reassuringly as she grabbed a bridle, "It's going to be okay, Dad, he won't get away--"

"Of course he won't. I just hate horses." Jack sighed as he reached for a saddle.

Sloane ignored the pain in his toe - gone and the pain in his nose - broken. Those damn Bristows - were they going to try to take him apart piece by piece? Starting with his heart, keeping Emily from him. When he escaped and he had no doubt he would, he would still have to hide. Jack was a predator at heart and would never stop searching. He saw it now, or rather he had seen it in the cold heat of Jack’s furious eyes just before his fist had broken bone. Jack had been playing with him. It had been a game, a set up. He should have known. He should have known.

Irina looked through binoculars and let out a soft cry at the same time as one of her guards. "There they are!" She spoke into her com unit, giving the others the location, a brush-filled area near the trail to the cliffs. Only the truly desperate would ever think that was adequate cover. Ah, but Arvin did not understand the true meaning of desperate yet. He would.

Sloane glanced over at Yasmina’s husband, helping him proceed, if not as stealthily as he might have wished, still craftily along the wall from whence they’d emerged from a narrow passage. There was a reason he had been head guard over Dave. An idiot would have lost Dave to one of his endless escape attempts. This man had been a worthy adversary for Dave, as stubborn as Dave and Laura. Too stubborn, if his offer to take him to Emily in exchange for a return to their hardscrabble existence was any indication. Maybe the man was an idiot, unable to acclimate himself to change and willing to consign his family to near starvation to salve his own stubborn pride. Pride was a luxury. He would abase himself before Emily to win her affections again. He would do anything.

"I'm already here," Dave told them. "We followed the trail. He must be coming here. She must be in one of these damn caves. I hate caves."

"I hate horses, but-- Dave, it’s not necessary. Just get out of there-" Jack urged into his communicator.

Sydney agreed. "You can’t want to go into those caves-"

"What I want is irrelevant. What I need is one shot at him. One shot, Jack," Dave grunted, forcing himself to walk over the uneven rocks to the edge, where Sark waited to help him.

"Who said you could kill him?" Jack prevaricated as he and Irina gestured to Sydney and Vaughn to head in the direction of the caves Sydney had investigated earlier with Zamir’s nephews.

"Who said I couldn’t?" Dave countered, lowering himself quickly over the edge. Sark had better catch him or...

"Shut. Up." Irina rolled her eyes and spoke firmly. "Both of you. My patience is not inexhaustible."

"Schoolteacher voice," Sark whispered as he grabbed Dave’s shoulders and held on while Dave gritted his teeth from the pain in his knee from the climb. Dave nodded and Sark let go to look in the nearest cave, shining his flashlight inside. He called out softly, to no answer.

"Schoolteacher -- That’s a good game," Jack noted with a sidelong glance at Irina as she slid off her horse and slapped it on its rump, sending it back to the stables.

Irina looked over her shoulder, noting that Vaughn and Sydney were carefully scoping the territory as well. They worked well, a good team professionally. Personally, well, that remained to be seen. She readjusted her grip on her gun. "Do you want me to get out my ruler and-"

"Do you really need to measure me after all this time?" Jack asked in mock surprise. "Really, I would have thought last night would have proved that I-"

"You are..." Irina looked carefully at Jack. "You are enjoying this. This is a game to you. A deadly game, but one nonetheless."

"Actually...It’s hunting. And there’s no point in hunting unless you’re going in for the kill." Jack looked over at Irina. She nodded. The cold implacable hardness of his eyes belied the light tones he’d been using just moments before.

"Down!" Sydney ordered suddenly and they all slid behind a large boulder to watch Sloane and another man, in a turban make their way to the edge of the cliff.

"It’s Yasmina’s husband," Irina whispered. "Damn, damn, damn. I should have listened more carefully when the tutor spoke of his intransigence and his pride, to say nothing of his prejudice-"

"Second guessing and an analogy with Jane Austen’s works can come later, Mom," Sydney suggested. "Right now the question is do we shoot or-"

"The knee!" Dave whispered to Sark, having turned back from shining his flashlight inside another cave. "Get his knee."

"Surely you want to wait until he’s down here," Sark suggested. "If I take out his knee now, he’ll fall and probably kill himself-"

"A good plan! Get it over with!" Irina hissed impatiently.

"But-" Jack began.

Dave finished, "But then we wouldn’t get to torture him again. And really, what’s the dinner without the appetizer?" He fell silent as Sloane and Yasmina’s husband cautiously descended the outcropping to the first ledge, then the second.

"I’m all for torture," a soft voice agreed in a nearly-silent whisper. "Really, Dave, if you’d kept shining that light a little longer, I wouldn’t have nearly killed myself-"

"God, she’s a whiner," Vaughn groaned as everyone else breathed a sighs of relief as she continued speaking.

"I want to take out the man with the turban. I don’t mean Vaughn, I mean Yasmina’s husband."

Sydney grinned. "Go for it."

The three near the cave held their positions and waited as the two men climbed down the embankment. "Here, in here, Sahib Sloane-" Yasmina’s husband pointed toward the mouth of one of the numerous caves.

"A cave?" Sloane grumbled. "My wife should not be in a cave! Dirty, filthy, rats--" He started forward.

"Now!" Dave ordered.

Sark nodded and silently pulled the trigger.

Zzzing
Thud
Thud

Sloane fell to his face, clawing at the ground, unseeing of anything but his own pain. Yasmina’s husband whirled around and then stopped, his eyes rolling to the back of his head as the woman withdrew the stun gun from his neck. She smiled grimly when he shuddered violently and fell to the ground. She flew back into the cave, checking her equipment as she ran.

"The game is still in play," Jack said softly as they stood up and ran toward the cliff.

Long moments passed and Sloane raised his head. Through glassy eyes, he sighted the cave and heard...was that a moan?
"Arvin...." A low voice cried out.

Sloane forced himself to rise, then fell back to the ground, reaching his hands out to try and move forward.

"Should I?" Sark lifted the barrel of his gun.

"Oh, let him crawl," Dave ordered in a tight voice, looking up at the cliff and seeing the rest of their team peering over the edge. Meeting Jack’s eyes, he continued, "I want to see him crawl. Or even better, I want him to cry out for help and hear nothing but silence."

Jack looked at the black hole of the cave before him. He would enter, and shortly, kill a man who had once been his friend. Without any real regrets. He would save his regrets for the innocents lost.

“Jack, I’d like you to meet my wife, Emily,” Arvin had said, touching Emily’s arm and drawing her forward.

“Jack. I’ve heard so very much about you!” Emily said in her soft voice, bubbling with repressed laughter and her eyes alight behind the lenses of her tortoiseshell frame glasses.

“Oh?” Jack forced a smile. Why was she laughing? Dave would tell him to just ask. “Is there some reason you’re laughing?”

Emily laughed aloud, her laughter tinkling above the sound of the other guests at the outdoor cocktail party at their house. “It’s just that Arvin has spoken of you so often and in such glowing terms, I was expecting a man with a cape.”

Jack felt his face flush. He gestured in a deprecating manner, looking away at Emily’s burgundy roses, their sweet scent heavy in the humid air of a summer night. “Apparently, Arvin must want a favor, then.”

Dave snorted as he walked up to them. “When doesn’t Arvin want a favor?”

Arvin rolled his eyes. “So says the man who just minutes ago asked if he could borrow my truck to move? Again.”

“You have a big truck.” Dave shrugged. “Speaking of which, I’ve been wondering about that-“

“About what?” Arvin bristled as he caught the glint of amusement in Jack’s eyes.

Always the peacemaker, Emily chuckled. “Moving from the dirt on one street to another again, Dave?”
“Hey, I clean when I move in and when I move out!” Dave grinned. “What more can anyone want?”

“Someday, you’ll meet a woman who will want more,” Emily teased. “Who will want to actually take off her shoes in your apartment without getting her feet dirty.”

Jack turned slightly and muttered, “That would imply that the feet of the women in Dave’s apartment ever actually touch the floor. Or that they don’t take one look and flee in terror.”

Arvin choked on his laughter and touching Jack’s arm led him slightly away from Dave and Emily’s light conversation into a more secluded area of Emily’s garden. “Jack, seriously. How are you doing after that last mission?”

Jack shrugged. “Fine. My stitches will come out by the end of the week. Thanks again for calling in that extraction team after we were separated-“

“Think nothing of it.” Arvin waved his hand dismissively. “Anyone could have been trapped in that situation.”

“Still, I know it was risky for you-“

Arvin shook his head. “What are a few risks among friends?”

Jack’s mouth tightened. He looked toward the path open before him leading into the open center of the garden and began walking toward it. “We wouldn’t have been at risk if that so-called friend of ours had not betrayed us.”

“You’re going to hunt him down and-“ Arvin broke off as Emily walked up, a drink in each hand. He smiled at her, enjoying the open affection on her face as she looked at him.

Presenting both men with a beer, Emily looked from one to the other. “Did I hear you say something about hunting? I didn’t think you hunted, Jack? My father enjoyed duck hunting.”

Jack smiled slightly as he lifted the glass to his mouth. “Actually, I prefer big game.”

“Jack?” Irina whispered as they crouched down to enter the cave behind Dave and Sark while Sydney and Vaughn followed. “Can you...” She trailed off at the indignant look on his face. “Sorry. But he was your friend-“

“Betrayal negates all debts and all friendship,” Jack said softly. He straightened as they entered a small chamber and Dave’s flashlight illuminated Arvin’s prone and unconscious form on the dirt. He looked around at the narrow space, the uneven walls refracting the straight beams of the yellow light. A small path at one end was nearly hidden by the deep shadows and the other entry was blocked by Sydney and Vaughn conversing quietly as they automatically moved to block that escape route. He rolled his shoulders. Eight people in this small space was almost too much, he thought, before looking down at Arvin. Still breathing. Good. “Although...This is almost unsporting. Like shooting fish in a barrel.”

“We should wake him up,” Dave agreed. He, for one, wanted to see the panic in Arvin’s eyes. He motioned toward Sark, who came forward and rolled Arvin over. Sydney came forward and poked Arvin in the ribs with her boot, before bending down to search for weapons. Irina hissed in a silent breath and dove forward as she saw movement. Her foot flashed forward and she kicked Arvin’s wrist, sending the gun flying. Bending down she grasped his wrist in her hands and gave a hard jerk.

Snap

“Damn it, honey, I wanted to do that this time.” Jack shook his head as Arvin cried out, then stopped, his face a caricature of shock as he looked around in the dim light.

“Why?” Sydney asked.

“Because your mother broke his other wrist the last time, when he made a pass at her. I thought it was my turn.”

“We can play that game later, you idiot,” Irina murmured.

“IRINA?” Arvin exclaimed. He forced down the stabbing pain in his knee, or what had been his knee to focus on the blurred sight before his eyes. He blinked rapidly, trying to dislodge the tears of pain or was it sweat? No, not sweat. It was cold in here. Or was that just the look in Jack’s eyes? He looked away from Jack and back at Irina. He fell back. His wrist. She had broken it once. Was he alive or...was this a flashback caused by pain? “You’re...alive!”

Irina sneered down at him. How pathetic he was, crawling in dirt. She knew it, knew the sight of desperation, having visited that focus of fear herself once, while searching for infinity. If only she’d known she’d had it and let it slip away. “Of course, I’m alive. You stupid fool, you couldn’t recognize a classic mirror ploy- “

“We don’t need to review the game plan, honey,” Jack interrupted. “This isn’t a movie in which we foolishly illuminate the plot details giving the opponent information-“

“There are far too many movies that make that mistake,” Dave agreed, moving forward.

Arvin blinked as he passed from unconsciousness into the bright light piercing the darkness of the cave. “Whaaat?” he asked, recognizing the silhouette of the person holding the flashlight. “Dave? Damn you. Damn you- is this your punishment for me? To just let me die here in an approximation of your sojourn in a cave--”

“It’s one way,” Dave said softly, fondling his gun. He spoke quietly, his deep voice reverberating around the space, bouncing off of the hard angles. “But there are other options-“

“Options A, B and-“ Jack began, stepping into the small pool of light, closer to Arvin.

“C? What’s your Option C, this time, Jack?” Arvin spat, his hoarse voice echoing hollowly around the confines of the cave. He looked up and up. Jack seemed terribly close. And large. Very large. Looming over him. Damn him and his size. An unfair advantage, he'd always thought. “You and your damn options The truth is-“

Dave’s harsh voice clipped out, “One truth I have discovered...” He stopped in front of him and pulling a gun out of his holster, used it to tip Sloane’s chin up. “Is that there are innumerable ways to die. Just when I thought I’d seen the worst form of death, I’d be exposed to yet another one. In the last twenty years I’ve learned is that there are many ways to die.”

Arvin took in a shallow breath. How many people were in here? “Twenty? You were only held for---”

“You’re not going back far enough. Twenty years ago I watched Jack be tortured. Watched him suffer needlessly due to your... careless evil. Live a living death. Without doubt the worst torture I’ve ever seen. Watching him was the worst torture I’ve ever suffered. Because it was so undeserved. So unnecessary.”

“And...” Arvn's eyes narrowed to focus on Dave. Dave, at times, had been more ruthless than Jack. Usually he preferred a swift end, but sometimes, the psychological...What game was Dave playing?

“And I learned from that experience. One should learn from one’s experiences, shouldn’t one?”

“Should one?” Arvin struggled to see Dave's eyes, but the light was on him, casting darkness over the others. How many others? He blinked, his vision blurring once again as Jack bent over him. One time, more than one time, Jack had helped him out of a tight spot, almost carrying him. Which was fair. He'd helped Jack many times too.

Dave's nostrils tightened as he smelle something unpleasant. “Of course. Even... rats are capable of learning. Perhaps you’re as smart as the average rat. But I think not.”

“Really?” Arvin prevaricated, his pain-filled mind searching blindly for an escape. Was it his imagination or were the walls closing in on him? Or was it just that all of these people in the space were stealing the oxygen?

“Really, Arvin,” Irina said with a slow smile. She bent forward too. She hoped he felt claustrophobic. “Did you truly believe that you could cross us and live to tell the tale?”

Arvin nodded slowly and took a deep breath. He might indeed die. Here. Today. In this damn cave. But...he ignored her to focus on Jack. He was the romantic one, the one who had been a fool for love. He might grant him one last favor. “But where is Emily?”

“Emily?” Sydney repeated.

“Emily.” Jack smiled. “You want to see Emily.”

“Yes. I presume you’re going to kill me, but for the sake of our old friendship, won’t you allow me to see her one last time?”

“I do believe that would be the humane option, don’t you, Jack?” Irina asked in a low voice.

“Absolutely, honey. I'm such a humanitarian, I'll no doubt get a medal this year." Jack called out, motioning with his hand. "Emily?”

Vaughn exited the cave and rushed forward as he saw Eric approaching. “Are you okay?”

“I’d have to be dead not to be in on this," Weiss noted, rubbing the back of his head. He noticed who stood outside the cave. "Hey, Nia. Your father’s arrived in a beer nut truck, by the way."

“Thanks. I need to get back to work.” Nia smiled up at Weiss before slipping back into the darkness. She liked Eric. Too bad he and Susan were so dog crazy; she’d much rather Sydney date him than this moody Vaughn of hers. Too much work, in her opinion. Speaking of which...

Arvin blinked up as the others parted and allowed a small woman to stand near his feet. “Emily?”

"Arvin... This time you have gone too far. Dave, Sydney, Jack, Laura....”

“You have to understand!” Arvin frowned as he peered up at her. He could see the silhouette of her hair against in the dim lighting of the others’ flashlights, but he needed to see her. He needed to... He needed to explain. She was holding herself apart from him. “I was doing it for us, for you.” When Emily did not say anything, he continued. “You know that. You know I would never hurt you. I sought power only -“

“At the expense of others!” Sydney interjected in disgust. “The crimes you have committed are innumerable.... against those you never met and those you once professed your love and loyalty to.” She stared down at him and touched her own gun, feeling the anger rise. She glanced at her father. Calm. He was calm. Too calm? How could he be so calm confronting the man who had committed the sin of betrayal over and over? Was it just that he’d been betrayed so often that he had become inured to it and simply viewed Arvin as another job? Or...She looked at him more closely and saw the tightness of his jaw. Was he just controlling it? Waiting...for what?

“Loyalty? You have to understand that I had to betray you all. I had to. Rambaldi commanded my loyalty- ”

“You didn’t have to. You chose to betray us over and over and over, Arvin. All of us,” Jack said quietly. Arvin had made a choice different from Irina’s - he refused to look into the mirror and see his true reflection. Now that the end was near, Jack felt a deep, cold certitude wash over him, along with regret. This ending was not destiny, it was the result of all of their choices. The classic tragedy, unnecessary and preventable, but for choices caused by hubris, pride. And self-absorption. It was over. There was no hope for his former friend. He had known that and had confirmation. Now, he wanted nothing more than to protect his loved ones and everyone else from the continuing pain this man before him would unleash, endlessly. He nodded at the small figure. “It’s always about choices.”

“You are not the man I knew, fell in love with, loved all those years. You are a stranger to me. Good bye."

"Emily!" Arvin called out frantically.

"Good bye."

“NO!” Arvin yelled. “Listen to me, damn it! Listen to me. I had no choice, no choice! We had so much to gain, no one else mattered, no one else matters!” When he heard no response, he blinked in confusion and then froze. “Did she go...?”

Jack snapped, seeing the painful realization on Arvin’s face. “Hurts, doesn’t it? Remember, you thought I might commit suicide from that pain? That I might think I was better off dead?"

At the anger in Jack’s voice, Irina looked over. Disgust and anger had passed over his face, followed by resignation. She looked down at Arvin, the focus of Jack’s gaze and realized that the same set of emotions might have been apparent had she made different choices in Panama and the same determination to end the tragic path would have been applied to her.

Arvin ignored Jack, then shook his head as he looked up at Dave. Psychological torture... "That wasn’t Emily."

"Wasn’t it?" Dave asked.

"No. Emily would never reject me like that, she...would...never..." Arvin trailed off as he realized that there was only one other option. He stared up at Jack, feeling the coldness in his eyes pinning him to the floor like a pin through the core of an insect specimen.

"I feel your pain, Arvin," Jack said softly. "I know what it feels like, after all, to have one’s wife die. To live with that pain. Or to find out she’s alive and chose not to stay with you. Another kind of pain. Which is worse?"

"Let’s see," Dave said, smiling grimly. "Which is worse? Option A or B? That Emily is dead due to your own greed for power, your decisions that placed her in jeopardy, caused her life to bleed away on an Italian field? Or that she is alive and rejected you?"
"I..." Arvin grimaced. They were going to kill him. He could not escape. They knew that. He knew that. They knew that and yet...Dave and Jack were going to torture him first in that peculiarly-effective way they had always worked together. This teamwork had been exactly what he’d worked to avoid with those years of Dave’s incarceration, the last years spent in a cave so similar to this one. A symmetry play, of course. Of course.

"I think I know!" Jack said sarcastically. "Or rather, I speak for myself. Discovering that she was alive and out of reach due to her own choices was worse. So, in the spirit of humanitarianism with which I am so very burdened on this lovely day...” He beckoned to an unseen point in the darkness behind Sydney.

Arvin blinked in confusion and tried to rise up as the small robed figure came closer. He stared intently as she pulled off the head covering, wire-frame glasses and a wig so close to Emily’s hair he had to wonder if it was her hair. But the woman was young, far too young to be Emily and...her face had been lightened with make up and she looked familiar, like a chimera of the past grown large... “Who are you...Wait. Zamir’s daughter. Amina.”

“Nia to my friends. You may call me...it hardly matters.” Nia looked over at Irina as she held out her Barbie keychain and smiled. A good breadcrumb, indeed. She slid it into one of the pockets of her robe where it clinked against the audio playback device with Marshall’s carefully created set of sentences based upon the three’s determination of the likeliest of Arvin’s responses.

Arvin hissed. “You’re here, pretending to be her, because...because...” He yelled, “She’s dead. Damn you all to hell!”

“Quite,” Nia said crisply and then stepped back. This ending was not hers.

Sloane snarled, “Damn Dixon -“

“Damn Dixon?” Sydney scoffed.

“Yes. He killed her, he killed her!” Arvin raged, feeling his hopes fade away from him, along with the steady drip of his blood onto the dirt floor. “I could have taken her away. I could have used Rambaldi to find immortality for us both, so that we would have forever and Dixon took it away from me! Rambaldi would not fail me, no, not after everything- I know almost everything. If I only had more time, more time, I could have had everything!”

Irina stared at him, aghast. Is this how she had appeared, full of her own self-importance, self-righteous, self-absorbed? She felt clammy in the close confines of the cave and suddenly understood claustrophobia for the first time as the walls of a self-made prison seemed to contract around her. She gasped as she felt a pinch on the back of her arm and looked down to see Jack’s hand moving back to his side.

“Dixon took it away from you?” Jack asked softly. “Even after you have had time to confront the truth, you still blame others for the consequences of your own actions. For the love of god...back on point. We’re back to options.” It was past time to move on. Past time.

"Two tough options, deciding which is worse, a live wife who rejects you or a dead one," Dave agreed. "But speaking of options, we need to return to our negotiations."

"Negotiations!" Arvin scoffed as they all seemed to draw nearer and the heat of their flashlights seemed to burn his flesh. "Cut the crap. You’re going to kill me. So, just do it already-"

"I think not. I think you lack empathy, Arvin. And it’s never too late to learn a life lesson while you still have life. So, allow me to give the ever-so-important benefit of experiencing a living hell. You know, like the living hell I experienced believing my wife was dead, then believing she had never made even one attempt to contact me, than watching my daughter recruited to work for one of the filthiest organizations to sully the earth in my life time, then-"

Irina stared at Jack as he continued on, his voice filled with cold rage. Finally she was seeing him truly angry and...yet he was still controlled. As was appropriate, of course. Being furious in a small space and multiple firearms was too dangerous, but still she was amazed at his ability to contain himself. She just wanted to kill the little bastard. Screw control, she'd like to grip her knife in a tight grasp and--

Arvin waved his hand dismissively, then held it up flat, trying to shield his face from the light. "Shut up, Jack, Get over it. You know, you should know that none of this matters. None of it--"

"What, my family and my life?"

"Yes. None of this matters. What matters is what you leave behind and my legacy of Rambaldi work -- surely, Irina, surely..... you understand.” Arvin stared up at her, seeing once again, only the silhouette of a woman. Perhaps it wasn’t her at all, perhaps...

Irina fingered the barrel of her gun longingly and gave Dave a glance. She was running out of patience.

Dave cleared his throat. "Yeah, and let’s not forget about what you did to me. But as much as I’d like to detail the events of my unfortunate incarceration, you might bleed out or die from shock first. And that would be a damn shame."

"Really, that would be quite unfortunate," Irina agreed. She glanced down at her watch. Were her servants digging that hole yet? She had plans.

"I believe you called dibs on his knee, which you got via Sark," Jack noted in Dave's direction. "With a gun, as was also your choice."

"Yes. In the knee with a gun in a cave, no less." Dave sighed happily.
"What is this?" Weiss asked Vaughn as they stood near the cave entrance. "A game of Clue, the to-the-death version?"

Nia smiled “Perfect description, Eric.”

"I have not yet gotten to use my knife. And I don’t care if the cave is messy," Irina noted. She glanced at Sark, then at her watch. He turned and left.

"True. But as for me..." Jack trailed off, looking down at Arvin. What...vermin. The rat had taken the bait, the trap had been sprung, and really the amount of time taken to break its neck had been too long. It was all about the timing.

"You wanted bare hands," Sydney softly reminded him, startling Sloane as he saw her pale face looking like a ghost in the background, barely visible now in the encroaching darkness as the walls of the cave -- no, the walls formed by the people who had been his friends seeemd to close in.

"True, true. But I think there is an Option D." Jack nodded.

"D?" Irina asked.

"D. As in damn perfect. Let’s all kill him in unison," Jack suggested.

"Hey, that works." Weiss turned to Vaughn. "That way no one is first or last. Everyone gets a fair share-"

Vaughn stared incredulously at Weiss. "I think you’ve been spending waaay too much time with the Bristows. Listen to yourself. Everyone gets a fair share at killing?"

"I think it sounds quite brilliant," Sark began, then stopped as three sharp blasts sounding as one blasted from the cave.

Chapter 2015: Part 4

They looked down into the empty hole. Time. It had taken time and lots of it to form that hole. For some of the watchers, the climb out of the hole had taken extraordinary effort. Extraordinary courage. Faith. Hope. Love. Using their own hands, their own hearts, they had clung to nearly-hidden holds. For others, the climb had been easier, helped along the way by the strong hands of others and who now, looking down, understood the value of loyalty and love as well as the cost of betrayal. And for those who could not see the freedom outside the hole, the hole was not empty at all. It was filled with the loud cacophonous sound of regret.

whoooosh went the wind...

"God. Aren’t you tired of the silence?" Dave asked, looking over at Jack. "I am. If I never have to hear silence again...If I never have to be alone in the silence, then life will be good. No more silence."

ssssfffftttt went the sand...

The sand sprayed through the air in an arc as the hole deepened before them.

Jack touched his ear, glad that he could hear once again after the sound of gunshots seemed to have faded. Now that the constraints had broken, that frozen column encasing him had melted or fallen away or...been chipped away with Sydney’s help, Judy’s help, his own determination, and yes, even his own anger with Irina, now...he felt free to feel, to hear, to speak. He looked up, feeling Dave’s gaze on him. He saw the question in his eyes and nodded. "Yeah. I’m tired of silence too."

ssssfffftttt

"Can I ask you..." Dave paused as Irina appeared over the edge of the cliff and came up behind them. All stood silently for a moment watching the guards finish digging the hole.

ssssfffftttt

"You know you can ask me anything." Jack said in a voice scarcely above a whisper, barely inaudible over the sound of the wind, as the music in his head seemed to fill the air around him. What song was that? He started and looked at Dave. "But what is it? About the silence when I was sick? That silence you broke with paying for me to hear Sydney’s name?" When Dave nodded, Jack did as well. He sighed deeply and looked back into the hole as he debated - how did one talk about silence, after all?

ssssfffftttt

Irina looked from one man to the other, unsurprised but still marveling at the deep connection between them that time and absence had not erased. And Dave, he was willing to wait for Jack to speak, but she was not. “Jack, aren’t you going to tell us about that silence? I’d truly like to know.”

ssssfffftttt

"You’d like to know? I don’t know...” Jack stopped, then looked at the hole. He could try. As long as he was alive, he still had the capability to try. Nothing was gained from...Focus on faith, not fear. Have faith that you can find the words, he told himself. He nodded, then turned to Dave. "You probably know this. Hell, no probably about it. You did know this, that’s why you paid to break the silence.”

ssssfffftttt

“Yes, that’s why,” Dave agreed, as the three all looked down into the hole, remembering prisons of all kinds.

”My infinity loop...” and rubbing her cheek on a filthy floor, searching, she knew now in the wrong place for the right treasure. Irina touched the three diamonds on her ring, each in their turn, then ran her fingertip along the eternity band supporting the diamonds, encircling her finger, reminding her of the present and future.

Seeing red the first time and blackness the next. Dave looked down at his right hand, then at his knee.

Sydney..... the voice whispered.

Jack shook his head. It seemed like both yesterday and eons ago. To him, deeply, personally, and yet to someone else. He looked down into the hole, remembering. Someone...trapped. He spoke up quickly now. “The silence was safer. The blackness seemed...softer than the light. The light...it was full of...” Jack held up his hand as they watched the dry sand fly through the air. “You know how you look toward a window with sunlight streaming in? And you see all those little dust motes you’d otherwise find invisible? Well, for me the silence was filled with the sound of regrets, endless just like the dust motes. Impossible to count. Impossible. But all there, filling the space, filling my head. If only, if only, if only...too many to count."

“If onlys are...” Irina bit her lip, the moved closer to Jack. “Horrible. I’m...sorry they were in your head.” She paused and added, “Sweetie.”

Jack smiled immediately and pulled her close within the circle of his arm. “So am I. But...it’s over. As long as I remember the lessons learned, it’s over. No more silence, no more feeling trapped.” He turned to Dave. “Enough of me. What silence of your own were you thinking about?”

Thud

Dave looked toward the caves and the noise. There was nothing to see yet. He might as well talk. Talking was better than silence. Hearing the voice, even if it was his own, told him that he was still alive. "As for me, I couldn’t see anything. The blackness was absolute. As was the silence. Almost. Almost silent. I could hear...creatures. Bats and rats and...bugs, I was sure.”

“Big ones?” Jack nodded.

Irina grimaced. “They’re always big.” Bigger in one’s imagination, which was why having too much imagination was not helpful, in her opinion.

Dave agreed. “Big ones. Except for the ones you’re afraid will crawl into your orifices.”
“Blech. You know, I could live without ever having that feeling again,” Jack mused.

“Yeah. And since no one else was talking to me, I...started to talk to them."

"That surprises me...not at all." Jack gave a small smile. Dave could easily talk to anyone, anywhere. That ability was one of his gifts. “But did you address them as Mr. Bug or did you pretend they were someone else? In the silence.”

“You know, in the silence, I talked to my parents, my friends, my enemies-“

“You mean you cursed at me and Arvin,” Irina said drily.

“A few times.” Dave shrugged.

“For once a masterpiece of understatement?” Jack asked.

“I took a page from your book, Jackie, took a page from your book.” Dave nodded at Jack. “I talked to you most of all, talked about what we would do when you rescued me - assuming I didn’t escape first.”

“What did you want to do?” Jack asked curiously. He would ignore the Jackie naming. For the moment.

“See my parents. See Sydney. Kill Arvin. Find Irina and get answers to some questions. I talked...to myself. But carefully, since I knew--”

Jack nodded at Irina, then Dave. "But you knew, of course, that lack of communication is one of the most effective torture devices ever created."

"Oh, I knew that. Intellectually. In my head. I also knew that - if Arvin were smart, which he was - he would have placed me with someone whose language I did not speak."

"Of course, so you couldn’t manipulate them.” Jack smiled.

"Who, me?" Dave grinned, then sobered as Sydney and Nia appeared over the edge of the cliff while directing the movement of the men carrying a figure shrouded in dark cloth. “You know,” he said, turning to look at Jack, to see his face. Calm resignation. He nodded. Good. Jack, far more than he and Irina, might have persisted in the hope that Arvin would make different choices, but once it had become apparent that up to the end he would insist on following the path to nowhere, Jack had not hesitated. He had seen what he had to do and done it. As they all had. All pragmatists, in the end.

Thud

They all looked back and watched the shroud come forward. Dave shivered as he saw it. The burka Nia had been wearing in her impersonation of a dead woman was now a shroud for a dead man. For a dead man. He had once thought he was dead. Waking up in some dark, dank hole, unable to see. “I thought I was dead once...” he began as Vaughn, Weiss, Sark and the guards began to lower the shroud into the deep hole. He watched silently as they completed their job, then spoke with soft words to Jack and Irina and to him as well, although he nodded without listening as they all left for home. The sounds of silence in his head were too loud.

Thud

Scrape

What was that? He struggled to sit up. Were they - whoever the hell they were - coming to kill him, torture him, or feed him? There were only three options, as he saw it. He’d have to tell Jack when he saw him. And he’d see him again; he was sure of it. Just as sure of it as he was of the gnawing pain in his belly that made him wonder if it was possible for his stomach to eat itself, just as the heart could kill itself with bitterness that ate into the soul. Jack... Damn it. He must still be...not well, if he hadn’t found him in all those years in the Soviet gulag. Damn it. Focus on Jack and Sydney, anything, to keep his mind off of...Yes! Light. He blinked, his eyes wanting to fill with tears, but his tear ducts were nearly dried from lack of water. “Who...” he croaked out, his voice rusty. Shut up, he told himself. Show no weakness. Show no curiosity which can be used against you. Show nothing. He was good at that, after all. Showing nothing was how he had survived and kept the children alive all those years. Well, except when he’d killed Gregor. Everyone had their limits. He was afraid he might be about to discover his own.

They hadn’t talked to him, the guards. Never. No words. The silence from them was so acute it was painful. As it was no doubt meant to be, he’d realized. Solitary confinement, the worst punishment for the human, a pack animal to the core. The need for social interaction so strong that people put up with abuse to retain it. The desperate need to communicate, he felt it. He felt the need and didn’t know at first whether to repress it or not. Who would win if he repressed the need and accepted the silent fate Arvin had dealt him? And then their silence grew literally painful as when he tried to speak to them, they would beat him. Arvin had instructed them well; he had known of Dave’s facility for languages, had probably forbidden them to speak to him for fear of his learning how to communicate.

But eventually, as captors do, they had lessened their own internal guard over time, becoming accustomed to him as if he were no more than an animal to feed and water. Miracle of miracles, they had begun to talk to each other, as if he could not understand. And he hadn’t, not at first. But he had nothing else to do. He was starving, in all ways. His body was starving, his brain was starving for stimulation. He knew too much imagination could lead to delusions in a malnourished mind. And he wanted to escape. Somehow, someway. He needed clues. He needed to know where this black place was! So, he had listened intently, starved for sound. Then his intellect had kicked in, that facility for languages built into his brain had started to categorize the words, the structure of the sentences and....then he had seen his chance for escape and taken it.
He hadn’t made it and had ended up back in the dark cave, but had found his way out in the bright curious eyes of a little girl and her mother on a starlit night.

"My name is Dave," he had said desperately, knowing that this moment was his chance. "Dave." Then he took a breath and realized the sounds were meaningless to her. He could not communicate his name unless she recognized the sounds. She needed to know his name so that she would realize he was more than an animal to feed and water, that he was as human as she was. His survival might depend upon that understanding. "Daoud. Daoud." He had tapped his chest.

"Ach! Yasmina." The small figure had tapped her chest.

“Yasmina...” he had whispered, looking up seeing only a shroud, then one walking in the darkness next to him as they’d gone back to the encampment. He had shivered seeing it, even as he was able to realize where he might be. But no, not with death. It was not death walking next to him. Death had come close, but had not won. Hidden under the shroud was his means of finding life again - the connection flowing from one person to another, as necessary for survival as water itself. Arvin, Arvin had lost it, the connection of life. He was the walking dead. Had Jack found his way back to life again? Had Irina? Or were they all still lost?

"I wondered, then," Dave finished.

“You were right, Dave. Now, we've been found. Or we found ourselves. Through grace. But then...we were all a little lost.” Jack agreed as Irina's guards picked up their shovels. “We were all lost for a long time. Or were we waiting to be found? It’s hard to believe it's come to an end, which is--”

“Oh, I’m ready to believe-“ Dave began as he bent over and picked up a spare shovel. He dug it into a pile of loose dirt. “That it’s time to say, ‘Good riddance.’ But I suppose...this is where we could say, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” He gestured at the small puff of dry particles his shovel sent into the air, before he tossed the shovel of dirt ito the hole. He really had nothing more to say. At the moment. He picked up another shovelful of dirt and sent it flying into the hole after the first one.

Thud

Dave handed the shovel to Jack. He shoved it into the dirt and threw a mound of dry brown dirt and sand purposefully into the hole. “But I’m ready to believe that it’s over. That we can be free of that curse...” Jack looked over at Irina. “That is a form of freedom. A basic one, but one I’ll take. To start.”

Thud

“To be free of that curse named Arvin Sloane...” Irina said firmly. She grabbed a shovel herself and with a firm shove, sent it into the pile of dirt and tossed it into the hole.

Thud

Irina glared down into the hole. “You will have no more power over us or anyone else anymore, Arvin Sloane. And with any luck, no one will even remember your name.” She walked to the edge of the hole and spat into it.

Dave looked over at Irina. “Was that some kind of Russian curse?”

“Actually,” Jack drawled as he pulled Irina back from the hole. “Your words reminded me of-“ He looked down at Irina and slid his hand onto her shoulder. He would not have killed her, but if she had not stopped her headlong pursuit into nothingness, she might have... But no, she had turned from her old patterns and found a new way. He smoothed her hair and cleared his throat. “Do you know what poem I’m thinking about?”

“The quotations game?” Dave asked, shaking his head, even as he felt the eager connection leap between Jack and Irina. He bent down to pick up a forgotten shovel and leaned on, feeling an ache in his knee begin to throb. At least the pain reminded him that he was alive, but these days he was ready to replace that sort of reminder with pleasure and happiness. No more silence, even if it meant listening to Jack and Lorena exchange literary strokes of foreplay.

“Of course.” Jack smiled. “Do you need a hint?”

“Da.” Irina leaned for a moment into Jack, then stood up straight, kicking at the sand. She smiled at Jack; he had dropped a preposition earlier. “Go ahead.”

Jack nodded. “I was thinking that...you were on a dangerous path set so long ago and I watched you looking at this mound of dirt which will soon look like the rest of the landscape. Dust to dust, as Dave said, but for -“

“Different choices. If I’d made different choices in Panama, I might have ended up in a different kind of hole, a prison or some shallow grave...” Irina turned her face into Jack’s neck and breathed in his scent. He was here, alive and he was hers. Again.

“Which you did not,” Dave pointed out. “You had - belatedly -“ He smiled gently as Irina glared at him, but with a hint of amusement in her eyes. “The strength to see the truth and seek freedom in this life, rather than allowing yourself to be led into the temptation of power...” He poked his shovel into the dirt again. “You proved stronger than your greatest weakness, something not everyone can do. You survived, we all survived. Our choices gave us continued life, unlike Arvin...” Dave shook his head.

“Yes. Different choices...” Jack agreed. “And I was watching you, honey. Glad you are alive, here, with us, now, instead of...there. Where your past patterns could have led you, had you allowed them to lead you into temptation. That ends here.” He pointed downward.

“In nothing? Dead or alive, it makes no difference at a dead end.” Irina nodded as they watched the dirt fill in the hole. The shrouded figure was gone now, covered with dirt that would soon sink into the cavern that once held the potential of a person. Gone, behind a door he had closed himself. “Truly nothing, in the end. Just gone, with no one to mourn him or want to remember him. Truly just...dust and sand.”

“Exactly. And so, I thought of this.” Jack paused and said in a soft cadence, ‘I met a traveler from an antique land-‘”

Irina smiled immediately and then triumphantly at Dave. “I know it!

‘I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read,
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed,
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.’”

“Shelley,” Jack said softly. "A lesser work, the experts call it. But I always thought..."

"It's perfect, Jack," Irina told him. "I've never agreed with those experts. And in this time and place, those words are perfect." They all looked out toward the west, as the last light fell across the sands.

Thud

They all looked down as the last shovel of earth fell onto the mound. Jack took the shovel from Dave and gently pushed down with the flat back, tamping down the dirt. He nodded and handed the shovel back to a guard. If Dave needed an arm to lean on, he could use one of theirs.

“Do you know what I was thinking of?” Irina asked, looking from the finality of the dirt on the ground toward the setting sun. It would rise again, but for now, the warmth would soon be gone and a chill would coat the air with goosebumps. She turned and put her arm around Jack, remembering. “You two...you were talking of holes and darkness and silence. Prisons not of your own making. While I ... my prisons had been ones I’d created, ones I’d built with the bricks of the game and the mortar of self-absorption. Just like Arvin’s. I’d closed my own door by...”
“Honey, stop...” Jack urged softly. “You did make different choices. Stop--”

Dave shook his head. “Let her go on, Jack. She needs to say it and...” He looked down at the hole, at the dirt mounded over it, the edges of it already skittering away in the wind. “Say it and then let it go. Right?”

“Yes. Let it go, Laura." Irina nodded, then began to speak rapidly. "I was so close, so dangerously close to picking up that Rambaldi heart document instead of Dave’s portfolio. And if I’d done that, picked up that document and left that portfolio closed...” She shook her head and looked down into the hole that was no more. “I would have been closing the door. Just like he did. I feel...every time I think of that moment and how close I was to making a fatal mistake, one you cannot run away from, one that closes your doors, limits your options to only one-“ She stopped abruptly. She wanted to stop. She needed to stop. She needed closure. She needed... Her mind spun with options, ways to find an end. A means to an end, which was just a beginning. Unlike Arvin, who was trapped by his own choices. Going nowhere. She had come home, found her way back, but-- “ Arvin... The place I was before...” She lifted her head. “I know. Remember on our last trip to Pakistan, Jack? We’ve been here before. We’ve all been here before. All of us. But--”

“Yes, we have,” Jack agreed. He frowned thoughtfully as he looked down into her expectant face. “We’ve been here...The place I was before. Oh.”

“Sing for me, Jack...” Irina suggested. “You sang at Dave’s funeral. So...it would give me closure if you would-“

“We can all sing,” Jack countered. “All of us need closure.” He looked at Dave. “Do you know what she’s talking about-“

“This is a quotations game I can play,” Dave said quickly.

Sydney turned around as she heard the wisps of a song floating toward her on the ever-present wind, borne along with the sand and dust. Vaughn stopped to wait for her. “What is it, Syd?”

“Don’t you hear it? Their voices?” Sydney whispered. “Listen.”

“Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
relax, said the night man,
We are programmed to receive.
You can checkout any time you like,
But you can never leave...”

“Hotel California. I hear it now.” Vaughn nodded as he looked over his shoulder at the three standing black figures silhouetted against the orange glow of the western sun, their individual features indistinguishable in the shadows, but their strength apparent to all who had eyes to see. He saw what he needed as well. Now. “Yeah, your mother liked that song. She must have persuaded Jack into singing it again with her.”

“Must have...” Sydney nodded and they hurried to catch up with the others, the guards following them after they laid aside their shovels, the job complete.

Irina looked at the mound of dirt in front of them, the wind already beginning the slow and inexorable process of erosion. Soon, there would be no indication that Arvin Sloane had ever been here. All of that focus on immortality, all of the pain caused by that pursuit and... She bent down and picked up a handful of light dirt, watching as the dry particles fell through her hand and hit not the ground, but flew off to the east in the stronger evening wind. Into nothing. She let it go. “It’s over.”

“It is over,” Jack agreed. Taking his wife’s hand and nodding at Dave, he looked toward the compound, which seemed to gleam at them in the setting sun. “Let’s go back to Querencia.”

“Yes, let’s go.” Irina agreed softly. Dave nodded. The three old friends set off together to begin anew on foundations far firmer than shifting sands.

TBC