Making New Memories

Author: Janet (SkyGirl5)

Genre: S/V, AU

Summary: Post Sydney’s missing 2 yrs

Disclaimer: Sydney, Vaughn, etc are properties of JJ Abrams and ABC.

Making New Memories

Almost twenty months of her life gone and that wasn’t even the worst part. A twenty month – over a year and a half – gap in her memory, but that was not the worst part. No clues as to who was responsible, still that was not the worst part. No, the worst part was that through all of it she had lost him and now she was alone.

Waking up thinking just a day or two, maybe a week, had passed only to find that twenty months had gone by and that Vaughn was married to a woman named Lauren Reed was a nightmare above all other nightmares. The missing time she could handle; after all, in her turbulent life worst had happened. Okay, so she could not think of anything worst instantly, but there had been worse things. She was alive, wasn’t she? Yes, but alone. In one instant (as far as she was concerned) Vaughn had been ripped away from her and she was not sure she could handle that.

It would have been one thing if Vaughn had been captured too, or killed trying to find her. Though that would have been equally tragic, it would have been no fault of Vaughn’s. At present, all of his betrayals were his and his alone made through his choices.

With her parents’ obvious absence in her life, Sydney had never before depended on anyone for anything. Such a thought was terrifying to a person as independent and self-sufficient as her. How could she open herself up and let someone in? Someone who might just be as big a disappointment to her as her father had been. With Vaughn, though, part of her was aching to let him in and give all of herself to him. For a while, she was too terrified to commit despite Vaughn’s tenderness and patience. When she finally gave in and allowed herself to fully love and be loved, it was more wonderful than she could have ever imagined.

For the first time in her life she was happy - truly, honestly, genuinely happy. She was happier than she had ever been with Danny or any other boyfriend mostly because she was comfortable with herself and her life. No lies, no secrets existed between them; there didn’t need to be. It was perfect and, in retrospect, too perfect. She should have known the bottom would drop out eventually, she simply did not realize how hard she would fall when it did.

Three nights and days had passed since she had hardly faced the new reality that was her life. Once of those nights was spent on a plane on her way back from Hong Kong, her point of reentry into the world. The other two she spent in a hospital bed in the medical services wing. The doctors there determined her to be in perfect health aside from the obvious gaping sink hole in her memory. Though specialists had been brought in, their only explanation for her lack of memories was post-traumatic stress and even that was a stretch. Simply put, it was a mystery that Sydney would need to figure out on her own.

Walking away from the medial services wing that Tuesday morning, Sydney was feeling extraordinarily low. After all, she was walking into nothing. She had no home, no belongings; all were destroyed in a fire thought to have taken her life. She was wearing borrowed clothes and unsure of where she would sleep that night. Of course, Weiss had offered his couch, but Sydney was skeptical of its cleanliness even if she appreciated the gesture greatly.

When she reached the need of the hall and came to a set of double doors, she paused. Behind them was the joint task force center main room where undoubtedly her old acquaintances would be waiting for her. Of course she was looking forward to seeing Dixon and Marshall once more. It was a certain other man she was positive she was not ready to see again. Knowing she had very little choice in the matter, she took a deep breath and pushed open the door to the second half of a life she was never meant to live.

~*~

“There she is!” Weiss proclaimed happily when Sydney sauntered her way into the rotunda. “I see you changed out of that attractive hospital gown.”

“Thank god,” she groaned under her breath. She then took a moment to glance around her surroundings. For once, the room appeared as though it had not aged a day. True, the computers were updated models, but everything else, right down to the desk chairs, was just as she remembered. “This place didn’t change much.”

“Of course not, Syd. Why would the US Government waste dollars redecorating when there are Stealth bombers to build?”

“Right,” she let out a breathy laugh, rocking back on her heels. When she allowed her gaze to drift around the room once more, she spotted him, all six feet of him with his perfectly mussed sandy hair, and a blonde woman trailing behind him. Immediately, all the hurt, all the betrayal came screaming back to her like a freight train at top speed. Her throat constricted, her chest tightened and she wasn’t sure if she was going to throw up or shoot someone. Thank goodness she didn’t have a gun. She cursed herself, pleaded with herself to look away and save herself the damage but she could not. All she could do was stare at Vaughn and the woman she could only presume was his wife and watch the scene unfold before her.

Vaughn looked stressed. His brow was more crinkled than she had ever seen it and there were dark lines under his eyes making it obvious he had not slept in days. Heck, neither had she. His fists were clenched and he was walking quickly in her direction yet he did not look at her; he may not have even seen her yet due to his obvious distraction. Suddenly, the slender blonde grabbed his arm and forced him to spin around. They began to argue, both of them speaking at the same time. Halfway across the room, Sydney had no hopes of hearing what they were saying, but from their body language she suspected this fight was ongoing.

When Weiss noticed Sydney’s eyes trained on a spot across the room for a long time, he too looked in that direction. Upon seeing Vaughn and his wife, he began to sweat. “Um, yeah, not much ahs changed out here, but we got this pretty sweet coffeemaker in the break room. C’mon let’s check it out,” He said, encouraging Sydney to move with his hand lightly on her arm.

“I…,” Sydney began hesitantly. At that exact moment, Vaughn looked in her direction and their eyes locked. Immediately it felt as though knives were pouring into her corneas and into her gut. Tears welled before she could stop them and her breathing grew rapid. Looking tentatively at Weiss, she managed, “I need to…” Without even finishing her sentence, Sydney scurried past Weiss and walked across the rotunda to a hallway she knew would be vacant. She needed to cry and yet wanted no one to see her weakness.

Once alone, Sydney leaned her shoulder against the wall and clamped both her hands over her mouth, trying to stifle the sobs. Tears poured down her face, soaking her cheeks and hands. She wished she had a tissue or, rather, a box of them. As her sobs continued, her knees grew weak and she began to slide down to the floor. Surprisingly, she did not load with a harsh crunch. Instead, strong arms caught her and lowered her down gently.

“Sydney.” His soft voice once soothing now haunted her. She tried to scramble away but for some reason her brain would not connect to her legs in that moment. Instead, all she could do was shake her head.

“No, Vaughn,” she managed to croak out. “No, go away…just…no.”

“Sydney,” he pleaded, moving his hands to cup her face. “Sydney, please listen to me.”

“No I don’t… I c-can’t,” She choked out.

“Please listen,” He continued. “Sydney I swear – I swear – if I had known you were alone I never would have… I never would have gotten married. Never. Instead, I was…I was grieving and not thinking straight because I was missing you because I loved you so much. I love you so much, Sydney, so much I couldn’t stand it when you went away and I lost my mind a little but I’m back now and so are you and we …we can-”

“No Vaughn; you’re married,” she cut him off in a shockingly strong voice.

He took a deep breath before continuing. “Two nights ago, I asked Lauren for a divorce. I’ve been at Weiss’s ever since. That’s what we were arguing over just now. She wants to work it out but I know there’s no way we ever can because I love you a million times more than I ever loved her and I only want you.”

With these words, Sydney looked up to Vaughn with surprise. He had captured her attention enough to stop her tears and make her want to plead him to continue. Seemingly hearing her thoughts, Vaughn picked up her hands and continued. “You know me, Sydney – I want everything to work out and everyone to be happy, but in this situation that is obviously impossible. Someone – well, everyone actually – is going to be hurt but I couldn’t stand to hurt you any more than I already have so I’m filing for divorce. Twenty months ago, I was going to take you to Santa Barbara and ask you to marry me. My hopes of that ever happening were lost long ago, but now they’re back and I just hope that maybe somehow we can…maybe…”

“I don’t know Vaughn,” she choked with honesty as her tears returned. “My life is so messed up I…I don’t even know how I’m going to …”

“I’ll help you; together we’ll figure it out. Please just tell me you’ll think about it?” he asked with great hope. Slowly, Sydney nodded her head before giving into the tears once more. That time, though, she allowed Vaughn to gather her up in his arms and gently rock her back and forth until all she could do was breathe.

~*~

For the fourth night in a row, Sydney couldn’t sleep. Every time she would shut her eyes she would open them again praying she had woken up from her horrible nightmare. After half a dozen disappointment she could take no more. Thanks to her father’s credit card, she was spending the night at a hotel. While Weiss assured her he had two couches, Sydney could not stand to stay in the same place as Vaughn. Doing so would have resulted in some sort of strange Three’s Company from hell.

She was no stranger to chronic insomnia thanks to her high octane life, but on that night unlike the others TV was not holding her attention. She was too confused having missed twenty months worth of cultural, political, and economic events. She had no had a chance to let Marshall catch her up either or perhaps she had no had the heart to face it.

For some reason, the emptiness of her hotel room was screaming at her, mocking her for all the gaping holes in her own life. Unable to stay there any longer, she decided to go for a walk – a long walk, actually. Somehow, after making her way through the streets of LA, she ended up at the pier. Leaning out over the railing, she contemplated what it would be like to swan dive over the side and get lost in the waves below.

Though she had expected to be alone there at one o’clock in the morning, she surprisingly was not. After just a few minutes, she heard footsteps approaching and knew exactly who it was from the rhythm of his gait. “I used to come here a lot in those first few months. For some reason, I thought this place was the closest point to heaven and just maybe if I talked to you out here you could hear me,” he said softly.

“What did you say?”

“I dunno… just the ramblings of a man who had just lost the love of his life.” For a few minutes they were silent until Vaughn finally asked, “Couldn’t you sleep…yeah, me neither,” he responded after she shook her head.

“I kept thinking about the first time we were here. I was such a wreck then…and now.”

“It’s only been a few days Sydney; it will get better,” he said encouragingly. She gave no response. “You know, that night was when I realized how ridiculously in love with you I was…and you were crying and I couldn’t even touch you because of stupid SD-6. At least now I can do what I wanted to that night.”

“What was that?” she asked with a slight gulp. Silently, Vaughn walked up behind her and put his arms around her waist, squeezing her as tightly as possible without being painful. Then, he gently kissed the side of her head and the two of them stood there listening to the sounds of the waves crashing against the sand together.

~*~

Two days later, on Thursday, Sydney was sitting at her desk attempting to analyze the latest data file given to her by Director Kendall. Due to her memory loss, she had been indefinitely reassigned to desk analyst duty, but she did not mind all that much. She was not quite ready to jump right back into the field less than a week after returning to the real world. Besides that, Vaughn and Weiss were there, too. Apparently, a few months after her disappearance Weiss had yet another near death experience and given up field duty for good. Vaughn, on the other hand, retired voluntarily from field duty since he could never feel the same way about a partner as he had with Sydney; without her, it was just too sad.

Just as she was about to fall asleep with her hand on her fist, Vaughn walked over and plopped himself down on the corner of her desk. The two of them had not really spoken since their night at the pier a day and a half earlier, but they had shared soft smiles across the office. “How about lunch?” Vaughn suggested with a grin plastered across his face. “It’s been ages since we just ate a meal together.”

“Yeah okay,” Sydney agreed before yawning. “Where’d Lauren go?”

“Back to DC,” he sighed. “Her family’s there…plus she said she could not stand to look at my ugly face a moment longer…”

“Oh Vaughn,” Sydney sighed patronizingly. “You’re not that ugly.”

“Thanks,” he laughed softly.

Before the two of them could make it more than a foot away from Sydney’s face, Jack, who was still a very active member of the CIA team, approached them. “I need you two to come with me,” he said in his typical cryptic, deep tone. Sydney and Vaughn exchanged curious glances before looking back at her father. “Now,” he added in a sharper tone. Knowing not to question the all-mighty Jack Bristow, they quickly followed.

Jack lead the way out to the CIA parking garage and over to his car, obviously wanting Sydney and Michael to get inside. Sydney climbed in the front passenger seat while Vaughn got in the back, nervously gulping as he did so. “Where are we going, Dad?”

“We’ll be there shortly,” Jack responded, giving no other clues. Sydney glanced back towards Vaughn, who merely shrugged his shoulders. Sydney gave him a very confused expression in return before turning to watch the road, hoping to figure out where they were going.

Ten minutes of driving later, Sydney had a very strong hunch as to their direction, but could not for the life of her figure out why her father was taking her and Vaughn to his apartment in the middle of the day. Since her father only sold her childhood home once she was permanently living out of the house, he had only had his smaller, more manageable apartment for about five years. In that time, though, she had only been inside three, possibly four times, obviously an indication of how close they weren’t for most of her adulthood.

“What are we doing here, Dad?” Sydney asked when Jack parked his car in the lot of his apartment complex.

“Follow me,” he said simply.

“This is where he lives?” Vaughn asked Sydney in a hushed voice as they followed Jack a few paces behind. Sydney nodded her head. “You don’t think he’s going to make us help him get rid of a body…do you?” he asked sounding genuinely concerned. Sydney gave Vaughn a ‘you’re insane’ look, though she noted he did have an at least somewhat valid point.

Jack led the way through the apartment building to the elevator, where the unlikely trio rode up to the sixth floor. Disembarking from the elevator, Jack walked quickly to his apartment at the end of the hall and pulled out a set of keys from his pocket to unlock the door. “Seriously, Dad, what’s going….on,” Sydney’s voice drifted off immediately when the apartment door open and she spotted her mother standing in the middle of the apartment. Irina’s hair was tied up in a high ponytail at the crown of her head and she was wearing a stained tank top and jeans; obviously not typical attire for her.

“Mom…,” Sydney uttered out with confusion when she and Vaughn stepped inside the apartment. She distinctly heard Vaughn mutter something under his breath, but chose to ignore it. In her mind, there were too many questions to process. Why had her father brought her there? To see her mother? Where they – she was terrified to muse – living together? That last thought nearly made her shiver.

Instead of responding verbally, Irina shifted her eyes between Sydney and Vaughn for a moment before looking to Jack and nodding. Then, quickly, she walked into one of the rooms branching off the sitting area. Sydney was just about to pose another set of questions when Irina returned, cradling a very young child in her arms.

“Wha…,” Sydney managed to croak out before looking behind her to Vaughn only to see his eyes were practically bulging right out of his head. Looking back to her mother, who was steadily approaching, Sydney gulped. “If that’s my little brother I’m gonna shoot myself,” she proclaimed.

“He is not your brother,” Irina paused when she stood directly in front of Sydney. Without even asking, she held the child up against Sydney’s chest, indicating her to take him. Sydney did so very awkwardly only because she could not formulate enough words to create a rebuttal. “He is your son,” she said simply.

“M-my-my s-so…what?!” Sydney stammered as she stared down at the little boy in her arms. He was dressed in white pants with a blue t-shirt displaying the red and yellow Superman emblem. His hair was a brownish blonde and swirled every which way on his head. His eyes, large and dark, gazed up at her curiously.

“I…I need to sit down,” she concluded finally. Still holding the child, she shuffled her way to her father’s sofa and flopped herself down on the middle cushion. A moment later, Vaughn sat beside her, but she hardly noticed. Her eyes were fixed on the baby now sitting on her knee and her mind was so full of thoughts one single one could not be focused on; she was going crazy.

“I don’t…understand,” she managed finally, glancing over to her parents, who were sitting across from them on another sofa.

“Well,” Irina said, glancing over to Jack, “It’s a very complicated story and even we don’t understand most of it.”

“Okay…,” Sydney said slowly, returning her eyes to the boy who, clearly, was not looking very happy. His face was beginning to scrunch up and he was beginning to make strange noises. Mildly afraid, Sydney leaned away from him, as though that would help her.

Vaughn, who had adapted to the situation in a shockingly short amount of time, cautiously reached over his arms to take the baby. Sydney willingly let him go and Vaughn lifted him up high in the air before bringing him back down. “Hey buddy,” Vaughn said happily. “Don’t you just have the handsomest little suit on? Yes you do.” Then he leaned over and blew a raspberry on the baby’s tummy, which resulted in him giggling loudly. Satisfied with this, Vaughn let the baby settle down in his lap. Only then did he glance over and see Sydney staring at him with awe.

“He looks just like Vaughn,” she commented tearfully. It was true. The young boy looked strikingly like Vaughn, especially when he smiled, showing off the shape of his eyes and the tiny dimple in his chin.

“We assumed as much,” Jack commented softly.

Before either of them could say another word, the baby on Vaughn’s lap began to reach out his pudgy little hands across the room in the direction of Irina. As he did this, he began grunting and whimpering. Seeing this, Irina crossed the seating area in one step and lifted the little boy up to her chest, where he immediately settled down, tucking his head against her shoulder. At this, Vaughn and Sydney exchanged curious glances.

“So, um…what’s his name?” Vaughn asked after a moment, desperate to cut the silence in the room with anything.

“William James, but we’re calling him James,” Jack said. Then added with a nod towards the elder woman in the room, “It was her idea.”

“How old is he?” Sydney asked softly.

“We’re guessing between nine and ten months, but we’re not positive,” Jack answered.

“Not…positive?” Sydney questioned, once again looking to Vaughn.

Jack sighed heavily and leaned forward slightly in his seat. “Well, as you know, ever since your disappearance I had been working with your mother to find something – anything about what happened. You see, we did not know whether or not you were alive, making our search very difficult. About eight months ago, Irina showed up on my doorstep with James in her arms. Naturally, I was shocked and genuinely concerned as to where she had gotten the child…that’s when she explained…,” he let his voice drift off as he glanced over to Irina, who was bouncing James on her knee.

“About a year ago I began hearing things once more about the Chosen One and apparently her offspring. Naturally, I was shocked because the chosen one was you and I knew you didn’t have any children… at least, not yet. Much to my horror, I found out that this baby was for sale for the highest bidder to purchase.”

“Oh god,” Sydney interjected a gasp.

“I know,” Irina sighed, notably hugging James a bit tighter. “Once I had verified that the child was actually the Chosen One’s or so the seller claimed, I came out of hiding and made an offer. I was told where I could find James and when I went to pick him up he could not have been more than a month old, but it was hard to tell not knowing if he was born prematurely or not. I brought him right here to your father.”

“We immediately compared his DNA against ours and were able to determine that he was our grandson, however that only confirmed that, not only that you were alive, but that he was actually your son,” Jack said to his daughter. “As for his father…we did the math and merely assumed,” he nodded to Vaughn.

“So…what happened next?” Sydney asked anxiously.

“Well…we knew we could not let James get away or, rather, anyone else get to him, so we raised him ourselves. No one knows about him. When we take him to the pediatrician, it’s under an alias; we felt it was safer that way since it is no secret who the Chosen One is,” Jack explained.

“Wow…,” Sydney exhaled.

The four adults plus James sat in relative silence for a full few minutes until Jack finally suggested, “Why don’t the two of you take James to the park? He could use the fresh air; I’m sure you all could.”

“I’ll get his jacket,” Irina said before disappearing from the room. She returned a minute later with James, fully dressed with a jacket and hat, and strapped him into the stroller beside the door. At this point, Vaughn grabbed a hold of Sydney’s arm and pulled her still rather shell shocked form to her feet and lead her gently towards the stroller for what would undoubtedly be an interesting walk.

~*~

“We have a kid… we have a kid… Oh my god, we have a kid Vaughn – a child!!!” Sydney repeated as they made their way towards the elevator.

“Yeah I realized that,” he said calmly.

As they stepped inside the elevator and the doors closed in front of them, Sydney continued to rant. “A child…a baby…we have a baby…we have a baby OH MY GOD!” she gasped as though she suddenly remembered something pivotal. Then, frantically, she began pulling her shirt out of its tucked position in her pants and then unbuttoned the button on the waistband.

“Are you…looking for another one?” Vaughn asked with confusion.

“NO! Look!” she exclaimed, pointing to the lower portion of her stomach where there was a single line scar that was rather noticeable.

“A c-section… a bad one,” Vaughn commented. Sydney looked up at him with uncertainty. Vaughn shrugged. “Could make sense.”

“This is just so… I don’t even know how to process this!” she exclaimed seriously while fixing her attire.

“I know,” Michael sighed. He, too, was having trouble with the concept of a child between himself and Sydney. Though he had wanted it for quite some time, he always imagined finding out Sydney was pregnant, watching her belly grow, the culmination of which would be a child to cradle in their arms. Being introduced to his nine (or ten) month old son was definitely something that would take getting used to.

Once outside Jack’s apartment building, Sydney and Vaughn walked down the sidewalk towards the nearby park. Vaughn pushed the stroller while Sydney walked at his side, her arms folded across her chest. Neither of them spoke in this time; they were a bit too consumed with wrapping their minds around the baby they were pushing that happened to be theirs.

“Can you believe they were going to sell him to the highest bidder?” Sydney asked finally. “I mean, god, what kind of people were they?” Vaughn glanced over to her and gave her a look clearly saying, ‘After eight years in this business you still need to ask that question?’ “Right…,” she sighed.

“I don’t know who they were Sydney, but the important part is that your parents had him and no one else… something I will unfortunately have to thank your mother for at some point,” he said with an edge of bitterness that made Sydney laugh softly.

When they came to a vacant park bench, they stopped walking and took seats with James’s stroller facing them. Vaughn leaned over and unhooked the straps holding him in before lifting him up onto his lap. Immediately, James began gasping at Vaughn’s tie with his tiny fingers before looking up to Vaughn and smiling with a few toothed grin.

“How is it possible that you’re so good with him? Are you hiding a whole family full of children I don’t know about?” Sydney asked seriously.

Vaughn laughed softly. “No, I swear I’ve never even held a baby until ten minutes ago. I’m just… I dunno, trying really hard to do what comes naturally combined with what I’ve observed on TV or in person… Trust me, if he started wailing at this moment I’d freak out.”

Sydney cracked a soft smile knowing she would as well. She reached over and rubbed one of James’s legs gently. When she did this, James put his hands on hers and grasped tightly to her middle finger. “God how are we going to do this… be parents…,” she wondered aloud.

“We’ll figure it out… something tells me with a lot of help from your father,” Vaughn told her seriously. She nodded, agreeing.

After a few more minutes of watching James play with Sydney’s fingers and Vaughn’s tie, Sydney began very softly, “Michael… I love you. I know we never said it before, but I felt it and I hoped you-”

“I knew,” he interjected with a soft smile. Sydney smiled back before leaning over and giving him a brief but soft kiss on the lips. Then, sighing, she flopped back against the park bench and rubbed her brow.

“God this is all just so…insane. It’s so much in just a few days…I think I’m gonna lose my mind…”

“I know that feeling,” Vaughn said with a slight groan. “But,” he paused to reach over and link their fingers together, “we just have to take it one day at a time.”

“Right,” she sighed.

~*~

After spending almost half an hour at the park, Sydney and Vaughn returned to Jack’s apartment to find Jack on the phone and no Irina in sight. “You think she left already?” Sydney whispered half-heartedly to Vaughn.

“I don’t want to get my hopes up too high,” Vaughn commented. Sydney laughed and elbowed him gently. Just a moment later, James began to whimper and whine in the stroller, wiggling his legs and arms about as though he was having a fit. Sydney and Vaughn merely took a step back and stared at him, completely baffled as to what their next course of action to do.

Seeing this, Jack promptly ended his phone call and approached the stroller. “You two clearly have a lot to learn,” he muttered to them as he picked James up with one arm. He carried him into the kitchen and returned a moment later with a bottle full of formula. This he held out into the space between Sydney and Michael, hoping one of them would take the initiative. Sydney glanced over at Michael before slowly taking the bottle, acting as though it was a bomb.

“Dad, seriously, I suck at this,” she told him, mildly fearful of the liquid in her hand.

“You are merely inexperienced Sydney,” he said, nodding for her to sit down on the couch. Once she did so, he put James in her arms and guided the bottle in her hand to his mouth. James, clearly no stranger to this feeding routine, grasped onto the bottle wit his tiny hands as he drank. Sydney glanced over to Vaughn cautiously as this was happening and couldn’t help but notice that he was laughing, though his amusement mostly came from the expressions of confusion and fear on her face.

“So, um,” Sydney began cautiously, “did Mom leave?”

“No, of course not; she’s in the shower,” Jack told her simply. “This might come as a surprise to you Sydney – frankly, it was one to me – but your mother is actually a very capable parent. As much as it pains me to admit, I doubt she’ll be disappearing anytime soon. She cares for James and as far as he is concerned we are the only parents he’s ever known.”

“Oh,” Sydney said quietly, glancing down to James, who was looking up to her with his large brown eyes. She smiled at him and he reached out and touched her hand with his. This simple action made her heart flutter; maybe parenting was not going to be so bad after all.

“Hold on a second,” Vaughn interrupted the peaceful silence with an obviously irritated tone. “I realize I’m a little late in this deduction but… you’ve had James for nine months, you knew he was Sydney’s child and thus knew she was alive at least up until his birth meaning she was not killed in the house fire. Is there a particular reason you chose not to inform me of this? Or that I had a son, for that matter?”

A scowl crossed Jack’s face, but Vaughn stood firm. “First of all, Agent Vaughn,” he began with a sharp edge, “we did not know James was your son. Yes, if he was born after a full forty week pregnancy, it would have virtually been impossible for him not to have been. However, if he was born prematurely, all bets were off.”

“But he looks just like me!” Vaughn insisted.

“Believe it or not, during the first few months of their life, babies to not exactly have a strong resemblance to any family member. His similar appearance to you only began in the past few months. Aside from that, as we mentioned before this was a very delicate situation. Many Rambaldi enthusiasts were after James making containment of his existence imperative. I could not simply make an announcement to the world that I had Sydney’s son in my possession.”

“I didn’t tell you to tell the world; I asked why you didn’t tell me,” Vaughn hissed.

“I felt it was better if the situation was kept under wraps,” Jack said simply.

“Stop arguing; you’re upsetting him,” Sydney snapped at both of them. The tense atmosphere in Jack’s apartment was cut after just another moment when Irina walked out of the bathroom, her hair wrapped in a towel, a long robe covering her body. She did not even seem fazed that Vaughn or anyone else was able to see her; she merely walked over to Sydney and smiled.

“How is he doing?” she asked sweetly.

“Okay I guess… how can you tell?” she asked seriously, gazing down at her son.

Irina laughed softly. “You’re doing just fine,” she said encouragingly, stroking the top of Sydney’s head. Then, just as suddenly as she appeared, she slipped away into one of the bedrooms, presumably to change into something more suitable than a terrycloth bathrobe.

Once she was gone, Vaughn cleared his throat loudly, clearly uncomfortable with the situation inside the Bristow apartment. “Well, I, um, guess I should be getting back to work…”

“Okay, I’m going to stay here, what do I care if they fire me?” Sydney said with a soft laugh. Vaughn smiled softly in return.

“Before we go…,” Jack paused to retrieve a small digital camera from the end table beside the sofa. He held it up to the two of them as a sign he was going to take their picture. Sydney put James’s bottle down before standing up beside Vaughn. He put his arm around her shoulders and they both smiled for their very first family picture.

“I’ll walk you out,” Sydney said softly to Vaughn. He nodded and the two of them walked out of the apartment and into the hall towards the elevator. Vaughn paused a few feet away from the elevator doors and turned to face Sydney and James. He leaned over and gave Sydney a long kiss on the forehead before doing the same to James.

“I’ll call you later,” he said softly to her. Sydney nodded before stepping aside and watching her father and Vaughn step on to the elevator. As she walked back inside the apartment, she could not help but laugh to herself, thinking about how awkward their car ride would be after their argument.

A few minutes later, as Sydney was examining James’s fingers and hands, having not had a chance to do that yet, Irina returned to the sitting room with a soft smile across her face. Watching her daughter and grandson together was something she was not sure she would ever be able to see. She was, however, thankful they were finally together. “He’s a good baby,” Irina told her softly. Sydney’s head snapped upright, startled by her mother’s presence. “He slept through the night very quickly and he’s not all that fussy unlike a certain other baby I knew,” she said with a pointed look.

“Sorry about that,” Sydney said with a slight laugh.

“It’s alright,” Irina smiled at her. “How about we put this little one down for his nap, hmm? C’mon I’ll show you how to change his diaper.”

She then led the way into the spare bedroom in Jack’s apartment which, Sydney noted immediately, had been converted into a nursery with soft blue walls and circus decorations on the walls. She gestured for Sydney to set James down on the changing table and she did so. Then, Irina proceeded to demonstrate the proper way to change his diaper and put all of his clothes on properly before she lifted him up, kissed his head, and laid him down in his crib.

“Mom, I don’t even know how to thank you for what you’ve done. I mean, if you hadn’t…James could be…” She let her voice drift off at the horrific thoughts of James in the hands of someone like Sark or McKennas Cole.

“Don’t worry about it, Sweetheart,” Irina smiled at her. “James is my grandbaby; of course I had to take him. We’re just glad you’re alright.”

“Relatively,” Sydney sighed. Irina reached over and patted her back softly before walking over to the bookshelves in Jack’s apartment and retrieving a large binder, stating that she hoped this item would help her. Sydney took the item curiously and opened it to find dozens of pictures of James.

“Clearly we used your father’s new camera a bit too much,” Irina commented with a soft laugh. Tearfully, Sydney gave her a soft smile before walking to the couch and beginning to pour though the book. She started at the beginning where James, approximately one month old, was photographed lying in a bassinet, bundled up in a blanket.

As the photos continued, James grew a bit older and more active. By far Sydney’s favorite picture in the bunch was one of her father positively covered in orange baby food obviously rejected by James; it made her laugh aloud. “God I’ve missed so much,” she sighed sadly.

“No you haven’t Sydney, not in the long run. Think of it this way – James hasn’t started crawling yet, or walking, or talking! You still have a lot of milestones left to witness,” Irina smiled at her.

~*~

Sydney spent Thursday night on her father’s couch so that she did not have to leave James. She hoped that she would never have to leave him again, though she knew it would be a while before she could take care of him on her own without panicking entirely. As she lie awake that night thinking about how dramatically her life had changed in the previous twelve hours, she began thinking about the future and how she wanted to live her life from that point forward. It was then she discovered the perfect solution.

Friday morning upon walking into her CIA office, she tried to find Vaughn but discovered he had not yet arrived. Slightly disappointed, she retreated to her desk to attempt to catch up on the work she had missed the previous afternoon while getting acquainted with her child. When Vaughn did arrive, though, any thoughts of work were abandoned and she walked over to him immediately.

“Hey, how’s you know who?” he asked softly.

“Really good,” she beamed. “This morning I fed him mashed bananas and it was so adorable.”

“I’m sorry I missed that,” Vaughn laughed softly.

“Well, actually, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” she began as she sat down in the chair beside him. “It’s just… so much has happened in the past twenty months, Vaughn and I don’t remember any of it. We don’t know who took me or why and we might never know. I might never get my memories back and that’s something I just have to face… but as long as I’m not getting those back I want to make new ones with you and James.

“I want us to be a family so…so this weekend I’m going to go house hunting and hopefully I’ll find one where you, me and James can live together because I’d really, really like that. I know we still have some stuff to work out but we will work it out so…what do you think?” she asked softly.

A grin broke out across Vaughn’s face. “I think it sounds amazing,” he told her before leaning in to give her a gentle kiss. Just then, Weiss rolled his desk chair from his own desk a few feet away, over to them.

“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop – well actually I did – but who the heck is James?!” Weiss demanded with confusion.

Sydney laughed softly. “James is our son.”

Weiss let out a hearty laugh. “Son…that’s a good one.”

“No he seriously is our son,” Vaughn told him.

“Right yeah ok, Syd was pregnant,” Weiss rolled his eyes dramatically.

“Weiss we’re serious,” Sydney continued.

“How gullible do you guys think I am?! It would be like… impossible for you to have a son – I know that!” Weiss insisted, slightly annoyed at how they were treating him.

“We can prove it, we just need…,” Sydney’s voice drifted off when Jack walked up to Vaughn’s desk and placed a file labeled ‘CONFIDENTIAL’ on it. Sydney picked up the folder and found inside just the thing she was looking for. “See,” she said, proudly holding up their family photo taken the day before.

“Holy shit,” Weiss proclaimed, snatching the picture out of her hands. “Is this for real?!”

“Of course,” Vaughn told him.

After a moment, Weiss’s face lit up like a child’s on Christmas morning. “Dude! I’m an uncle!” he proclaimed happily. Sydney and Vaughn laughed. “He’s just so cute!! He looks like Vaughn.”

“We know,” Sydney and Vaughn smiled in unison. Sydney took the photograph back with a smile knowing that whatever happened in those past twenty months didn’t matter anymore; that picture represented her future and it was happy.