Fic commentary: Airs Water Places I (Alias)

[vaznetti]

kerlin asked for a commentary on Airs Waters Places; since it's a rather long story, I decided to do just the first part. The full story can be found here. Back when we were doing the Sark interviews, I did one for the Sark in this story; rez_lo provided the questions. The answers (here) shed a bit more light on the story, I think.

Anyway, here we go.


Airs, Waters, Places I
by Vanzetti

...Airs, waters, places, round our sex and reasons,

Are what we feed on as we make our choice.
We bring them back with promises to free them,
But as ourselves continually betray them:

They hear their deaths lamented in our voice...
(W. H. Auden, In Time of War IX, 1938)

You can't go wrong with Auden's "In Time of War" sonnet sequence. I get a lot of inspiration from Auden. it's also the name of a Hippocratic treatise I did a bit of work on, and the idea that people's natures are shaped by their physical surroundings is not irrelevant to this story.

Part 1: America

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I just don't remember..."

This story picks up just after the Alias S2 season finale -- at which point it wasn't clear that Will would survive. This intro section is really just to set the scene -- Will's frustration, and Vaughn's and most of all Jack's. I wonder now if there isn't a bit too much infodump here. But it needs to be clear that Sark isn't Jack's first choice of ally, or even his second.

The frustration in Will Tippin's voice made it clear that he too heard the echo of his earlier, drug induced amnesia.

"We fought, Francie and I. I mean, Allison Doren. I remember the blood, and then nothing. Darkness."

"You were found in a pool of your own blood, without a scratch on you..." Weiss took over the debriefing while Vaughn paced back and forth in the interrogation room, four long paces from one wall to the other, then back four paces more.

Jack turned away from the observation window. Will didn't know anything, and he had better uses for his time. Sloane's spy dead and Sydney missing: it might have been Derevko, trying to protect their daughter in her own twisted way, but that didn't quite fit. It was Sloane: Jack would stake his career on the belief that Sloane had his daughter. In fact, he was doing precisely that.

Jack almost always calls Irina "Derevko" in this story. It's his way of denying their relationship.

This is mostly a story about Jack -- it's in his point of view, it's his journey, his coming-to-terms with what he will and will not do to save his daughter. My challenge was to write a story about the Jack-Sark relationship without moving too far outside the plausible bounds set by canon, as I saw them, and without moving the focus of the story away from the essential point -- the search for Sydney.

* * *

Next stop, Marshall. No one was saying no to Jack right now, not with Sydney missing, but Marshall's forehead was wrinkled. "You know, Agent Bristow--I mean, you do know this, I'm pretty sure you know this, but this was an SD-6 code, and you asked me to send it on an old SD-6 channel, and I was wondering--I mean, not really, it only occurred to me, but--"

Oh, Marshall! he was enormous fun to write in this scene, as he tries to tell Jack that he knows exactly what Jack is doing without doing anything that will make Jack's head explode. And the contrast between his dialogue and Jack's is so strong that one could take out everything but the actual lines of dialogue, and still know who was speaking.

Jack cut him off. "Was there any response?"

"Um... no. Not yet. I can keep sending it, but I don't think that--"

"Keep trying it."

Marshall followed him when he walked off; when he turned back to glare, the other man stopped. "I tried some other channels too," he blurted out. "Just in case. I mean, you don't have to answer this, because I know it isn't any of my business--"

"Exactly."

"--and see, I knew you were going to say that. OK, OK, Agent Bristow," Marshall held his hands up in front of himself. "But no one is responding."

"I see." Marshall wouldn't meet his eyes. If this conversation went on any longer one or the other of them might have to acknowledge that Bristow had asked Marshall to get a message to Arvin Sloane, and that Arvin wasn't answering. "Thank you," he said.

I also like that Marshall makes use of their shared SD-1 past here, and anticipates what Jack wants him to do. Marshall is no idiot.

On to the next one.

* * *

So in the last two scenes, which are really just setting things up, we see Jack rejecting his preferred options -- working through Vaughn, Will etc. and trying to activate an SD-1 network. Now he turns to his next resource: Sark.

The interaction between Jack and Sark here sets the template for their whole relation -- they're imperfect images of each other, which means that Jack, at least, understands Sark very well. He just isn't terribly interested in Sark as a human being. (This is a difference between me, the author, and Jack, the pov character. Jack doesn't much care for Sark, and I was careful to keep that fact inthe front of my mind when I wrote him.)

Sark lay flat on his back on the cell bunk, showing no reaction as Jack approached. All right, he thought. If that was how Sark wanted to play it...

He stopped a foot away from the glass. "Where is she?"

He waited a full thirty seconds, letting the silence stretch out. There was no response.

30 seconds is a long time to hold a silence. It seems longer than it is.

"You're wasting my time, Sark."

At that, Sark sat up, leaning back against the wall. "Agent Bristow," he acknowledged. "I have no control over how you choose to spend your time."

Sark can't actually resist the power of Jack's will. Also, he wants something. I mean, he'd like to get out of the cell, but he really, really wants to know what happened to Allison. (My Sarks tend to be serious about their canon relationships, and this one is no exception.) When I first planned this conversation, there was a whole subtext-conversation behind it.

"Don't toy with me. Where is she?"

"How can I help you when you insist on imprecision?"

"You know who I'm talking about." He watched Sark carefully: he needed something he could use against the younger man. Sark's posture remained relaxed, his hands loose in his lap and his head tilted up toward Jack.

"Humor me."

"We can always continue this conversation elsewhere. I'm sure you're familiar with the effects of sodium penthotal."

Should that be pentothal? It looks wrong both ways, to me. Anyway, obviously enough, each of them is trying to make the other volunteer a piece of information -- any piece of information -- without offering anything in return.

Sark smiled at him. "Drugs? How vulgar. But if it will satisfy you, I have no idea where Irina Derevko is."

Sark only volunteers a name (and it's the name he knows Jack isn't interested in) after he's driven Jack to threaten him. He sees this as an advantage to him, but Jack, below, also learns from it -- because if there's a name Sark is willing to volunteer, that implies that there are names he isn't willing to volunteer.

"What makes you think I was asking about Derevko?" He felt a moment of satisfaction: the threat had worked. He knew that Sark was hiding something.

"Really?" His voice seemed faintly mocking. "Have you lost track of Sydney, then?"

His daughter's name on this man's lips caught him off-guard, wiping away the small satisfaction. Jack forced himself to relax: letting Sark see the violence in him would be counter-productive. He concentrated on keeping his hands loose at his sides and his posture unchanged, so engrossed that he very nearly missed Sark's next comment.

What I like here is that Sark thinks that this is another meaningful silence, but actually, it's Jack reminding himself that Sark's no use to him dead, no matter how nice it would feel in the short term to kill him. This was before Jack took to killing people first and then bringing them back to life so he could ask them questions later.

"Unless there's someone else you've misplaced?" Just the slightest edge to the mockery, now: Jack's long silence had disturbed Sark for some reason. It was, Jack suddenly guessed, costing Sark nearly as much to maintain his facade as it was costing him. What was Sark hiding? Whatever it was, it was important.

He ran through a list of possibilities, followed an instinct. "We found your spy."

Jack's the master. He's very good at what he does. He walks into this room with no idea that Allison Doren had any ties to Sark, and walks out knowing enough about that relationship to use it to make Sark do whatever he wants.

Now, that was interesting. Only for a fraction of a second, all expression left Sark's face. He recovered quickly, saying, "An unavoidable risk with undercover agents, as I'm sure you know." But there was a change, something new in his eyes. If Jack had to give it a name, he would have called it fear.

That was it: Sark's weakness. Jack pushed harder. "She's dead." He knew what it took for a man to will his emotions off his face, to stifle any human response; he conceded within himself a flicker of admiration for Sark's effort, but pressed on while the other man would still be vulnerable. "Where is my daughter?"

And I think this is the first moment that Jack acknowledges any sympathy between them -- he knows exactly how difficult it is for Sark to pretend he doesn't care.

"I don't know," Sark answered. "But I know how to find out." He paused. "Sloane assembled Il Dire in Mexico City, didn't he? Now he has activated it." The smile was back on his face, his mask perfect again. "Who would have thought that Arvin Sloane's madness would bear fruit? The CIA will never find him, you know."

Sark talks too much to cover up his distress. It's a weakness.

"But you can?"

"You would have to release me first." Sark sounded almost apologetic as he stated his terms.

"Did you learn that tactic from Derevko?"

A line that will be repeated in the next scene -- there's a lot of meaningful repetition inthis story.

"There is a limit to what I can accomplish from a cell. But if you'd prefer to leave Sydney in Sloane's care..." he let his voice trail off and gave a little shrug.

"I would prefer," Jack said, "not to be taken for a fool." He turned on his heel and left the room. When he checked the monitors in the guardroom he saw that Sark had lain down and was staring at nothing.

Both Jack and Sark realize that these are only preliminary negotiations, but of course the can't admit that. Sark has grasped Jack's situation well enough: that Jack will do pretty much anything if it results in Sydney's return to him, and that freeing Sark is definitely on the table. So Sark is not displeased with the end of the conversation. Jack is looking for a way to manipulate Sark, and figures that Allison Doren is the key he needs.

* * *

Kendall's sympathy was going to drive Jack to violence. He clenched his teeth and hoped that the other man was not going to slap him on the back in some gesture of solidarity. "I can't imagine how you must be feeling, Jack."

"No," Jack answered, biting off every word. "You can't. I need Sark's information."

Jack is not a man for platitudes.

Kendall is on of those characters I rather miss. Not enough to watch Lost, but still. He knows exactly what's going on, and is trying to figure out if it's possible to stop Jack, and if so, whether it would be worth the cost.

"If I say no, are you going to go ahead and do this one your own?"

Jack stared at him.

"What about Michael Vaughn? He's going to want to know what you're planning."

"I'll handle Vaughn," Jack told him.

I think that over the course of the show Jack has developed a certain amount of respect (and even liking) for Vaughn, but back in S2 that was much more tenuous, and in a moment like this, I think it would not be out of character for Jack to decide that Vaughn is excess weight, and to ditch him. Jack is interested in what Sloane and Irina are doing, at least insofar as it affects his daughter; Sark is useful as a link to those two, but Vaughn isn't.

* * *

Somewhere in the course of his insalubrious career, Jack reflected an hour later, Sark had developed an impressive ability to resist interrogation ("insalubrious career" -- hee!). He allowed Vaughn another fifteen minutes with the prisoner, then called him out of the room and went in himself.

"Oh, look," Sark said. His voice was thick. "It's the good cop." He ran his tongue over his teeth as if to check that they were all still there.

Vaughn probably doesn't have Jack's expertise, but I'm sure he managed to do some damage. I also think that there's a certain amount of humor as identifying Jack as "the good cop."

"Tell me where Sloane is, and all this will end."

"But I'm only starting to enjoy myself."

"The bones in your hand should be set immediately, to avoid the risk of permanent damage."

Fantasy medicine! Sark's hand heals much faster than it should, I suspect!

"Thank you for your advice."

"Michael Vaughn is an impatient man."

Sark grimaced. "Don't insult my intelligence, Agent Bristow. Vaughn is doing exactly what you instructed him to do." He swallowed. "Did you learn that tactic from Derevko?"

Which is the question Jack asked him, in the scene above. Irina is the sign of their similarity in this story, the thing they have in common. Note that Jack gets angry (or shuts himself down) when Sark mentions Sydney, but not when he mentions Irina. Jack has a certain amount of buried curiosity about the nature of Sark's relationship with Irina, in part because he wonders whether it can be used to fill in the gaps in his understanding of his relationship with Irina, and also Sydney's.

"Who was Allison Doren?

It took Sark a little longer to control his face, this time. "No one."

There are a lot of echoes of this scene later on -- so for example, when Jack asks Irina who Sark is, in section 3, she answers, "No one. No one at all."

Jack leaned over him, inches away from the other man. "You must have known what would happen to her. Did you really believe you could get her out alive?" The words echoed unpleasantly in Jack's head, but he pushed on: Sark's weakness was clear in the anger in his eyes and the firm set of his chin. "You must have known that Derevko and Sloane would give you up, would sacrifice her. Are you really still loyal to them?"

I wonder if it's clear that what Jack is saying to Sark has unpleasant echoes of what happened to Sydney -- in the end Jaco couldn't protect her, either. I sometimes wonder what it takes for Jack to let Sydney do what she does -- indeed, to send her out on the kinds of missions she takes -- knowing what could happen to her. There's something rather horrible there. I think that at first, this just drives Jack's anger against Sloane -- Sloane started the whole thing, after all, by recruiting Sydney to SD-6 -- but Jack continues to use her.

"One learns to tolerate betrayal, if one is to remain in Irina Derevko's company."

Ha! I talk about this line a bit more in the Sark interview.

"And Arvin Sloane?"

Had Sark not been strapped down, Jack suspected he would have shrugged. That anger wasn't directed at Sloane, then, or Derevko or even Jack. He watched Sark's eyes revert to clear, cold blue, let the other man believe that the worst was over. Then he leaned in and whispered in Sark's ear.

"If you tell me how to find Sloane, I'll let Vaughn come back in here." That was satisfying. Jack had become a connoisseur of self-loathing; it was a pleasure to be able to recognize the same emotion on Sark's young face. "You'd prefer that. Something to distract you from the real pain, isn't that right?"

Good Lord! Where did all this self-loathing come from? I think this is a sign of how completely focused Jack is on the task at hand -- he might in other circumstances reject the notion of similarity between himself and Sark, but in this case, he knows exactly what it is to send a woman you love into danger, and to lose her, and he knows what Sark is suffering.

Although now that I think about it, this assumes that Jack believes that Sark possesses a certain degree of humanity -- but I suppose that's what he learned in the last scene.

If nothing else, it was good to know that someone else was suffering. He watched Sark get himself back under control. Not that it mattered: he must have known what Jack had seen. Just a second before he thought Sark would be able to speak, he stepped back. "No answer, Sark?" he asked. "Then I'll just have to leave you here to think about it."

As he closed the door behind him he checked his watch. 4:03 AM. Good. Vaughn was waiting in the observation room. "Do you want me to..."

"No," he said. The relief on Vaughn's face was almost amusing. "But could you..." he hesitated. "Would you go back to Sydney's apartment, Michael? Our teams might have missed a clue, a sign, something."

I suspect that anyone reading this knows that Vaughn isn't one of my favorite characters, and he does get sidelined in this story. In my defense, I'll say that I think that Vaughn is a good man -- here, he has very clear doubts about torturing Sark, although he'll do it for Jack's sake (and Sydney's) -- as does Jack, and that Jack thinks that Vaughn's very goodness will make it impossible to do whatever it is Jack might need to do. To Jack, Vaughn's reluctance to go back in and break all the bones in Sark's other hand is a sign of his unsuitability. Jack is all about using the right tool for the right job.

My, times have changed!

I guess I could talk about torture here. Or not. What I will say is that Jack has no interest in using physical pain to get a piece of information from Sark; he has better ways to do that. He is interested in demonstrating his power over Sark, and demonstrating to Sark that he understands him better than one might expect.

Vaughn straightened. "Of course," he said. He reached the far end of the corridor before turning back. "We'll find her, Jack. We will."

Jack nodded. Well. Someone would.

Kendall's voice disturbed him. "You shouldn't shut him out."

Kendall is sort of my conscience in this story.

Jack wondered how much Kendall had heard, then decided it didn't matter. "I don't want to argue with him."

"Or with me. I'm only letting you do this because I can't figure out how to stop you."

To Jack's practiced eye, the assistant director looked worried. "Do you have the paperwork ready?"

"I want to put a tracer on you."

"I'll just take it out."

"What if you need backup, Jack? Sark is a very dangerous man. What makes you think that he's not going to betray you or try to kill you, first chance he gets?

"I expect him to."

"Then why go ahead with this?"

"Because Sark is our best link to Sloane and Derevko."

Kendall looked like he was swallowing some kind of reply. Jack guessed that it had something to do with Sydney, and held out his hand for the paperwork. "It's all in order," Kendall said. "Prisoner transfer to Camp Harris, in your custody. I expect you to make sure that Sark makes it there in the end."

Jack didn't bother answering.

Jack really doesn't care what happens to Sark, or Kendall, or himself. Kendall knows that, but has to at least try to remind Jack that there's aworld outside of Sydney.

* * *

Silence from Marshall was even more disconcerting than the constant babbling, Jack discovered. "You can double-check this with Kendall."

That line really doesn't sound like Jack at all, does it? oops.

"That's OK, Agent Bristow. Just remember that you need to release the antidote every eight hours. Um, unless you want him to die. I guess."

Thanking Marshall twice in the same night would be ridiculous. Jack picked up the transmitter and the implants, hearing Marshall's whispered "Good luck," following him out the door.

Marshall isn't entirely people-stupid. I like his relationship with Jack, here.

* * *

Jack paused at the observation window: Sark lay still in the chair, apparently asleep. A doctor had been in to splint his hand and clean up the other obvious injuries, but Jack was on his own when it came to inserting the implants. Poison and an antidote, a simple enough means of controlling the other man.

More fantasy medicine! Yay!

The events of the night were beginning to tell on Sark: despite his relaxed posture his mouth was a thin, tense line. It was all too tempting, Jack knew, to consider anyone of his age a boy, to ignore the ruthless self-control, the kills confirmed and suspected, the lifetime's experience in betrayal and deception. But Sark's youth was just one more lie. He would not be taken in by it.

I have a long-standing hatred of the term "boy," in fan fiction -- it's a personal idiosyncrisy brought about by reading too many crappy stories which used the term. So this might be one of those gratuitous points where the author speaks through a character. Did it seem out-of-character for Jack?

Sark's eyes opened as soon as Jack entered the room. He kept his eyes on Jack's face while Jack inserted the implant with the poison and then the antidote into his arm. If he was afraid, he was covering it well. He raised an eyebrow as Jack began to unstrap him from the chair and nodded at Jack's impatient, "Can you stand? Good," Jack said. "Get up." He offered no explanations and Sark asked no questions, although he did wince when Jack cuffed his hands behind his back. The right cuff barely fit over the splint: Jack would have to figure out a better way to keep Sark in line.

It was 5:38 AM. The night shift workers were starting to think about going home, and even Dixon and Vaughn wouldn't be in before 6. Jack kept his attention on his prisoner as they walked through the building. He did not permit himself to focus on the familiar offices and corridors and faces or to wonder when he might be back. He handed the paperwork to one more guard and added his signature to one more document. "Transfer to Camp Harris," he explained. There were no questions.

Timing is everything.

He put Sark into the passenger seat of his car and then it was just one more checkpoint at the entrance to the garage. Sark was leaning forward against the seatbelt to keep the weight off his broken hand. It looked uncomfortable.

Out on the road, his cellphone rang. Keeping one eye on Sark and another on the traffic, he flipped it open. "Bristow," he said.

"Jack." It was Vaughn, and Jack could tell from his voice that he hadn't slept. "I'm in Sydney's apartment. I think I've found something."

"Tell me."

"I found traces of packing material in the bathroom. I think it will match the packing material we found left behind in Mexico City."

"And it isn't from Sydney?"

"Neither of us went into the room where the Rambaldi device was assembled."

"You think Sloane was there."

Vaughn was quiet for a moment. "Or Irina Derevko."

"I'm in my car. I'll be right over." He should have done something about Arvin Sloane years ago, and to hell with the CIA and SD-6 and Rambaldi and his crazy devices. Sloane and his promises and his false concern and...

What's interesting is that no matter how angry Jack is here -- and he's very angry indeed, even though Vaughn is only confirming what he suspects -- he doesn't change his plans. (I think Jack has a certain amount of built up anger toward Sloane. In moments likethis, where Sloane is threatening Sydney, it boils over. And do remember that I wrote this after S2, before Sloane had begun his slow crawl into the light.

"This isn't the way to Sydney's apartment," Sark observed. Jack didn't respond; he could have lived without the reminder that Sark knew his daughter's address. About a minute later, Sark continued, "It isn't the road to Camp Harris, either." He could feel the younger man's eyes on him, but didn't allow himself to react. "What exactly was on those papers, Agent Bristow?"

"Let me explain how this will work," Jack said, keeping his voice toneless. "You will do what I tell you. You will put me in contact with Sloane, and you will help me find my daughter. If you do not do what I tell you, I will kill you. If Sloane does not know where Sydney is, I will kill you. Is that clear?"

"Is there any point at all to my asking what I'm supposed to get out of this relationship?"

Is it bad form to admit that you find your own writing amusing, at times?

"Don't test me, Sark. Where is Sloane?"

When he glanced over, he could see Sark calculating something: his odds of survival, perhaps. He leaned forward and slightly away. "These will have to come off."

Obviously, they will come off eventually -- but Sark wants it to happen on his terms. This is pretty much their relationship in a nutshell -- they're both being driven -- Jack by necessity, Sark by Jack -- and there's a certain inevitability to everything they do -- but within that inevitability, they're both struggling for control.

"No."

"Agent Bristow, we wouldn't be here if you didn't need my information. I agree. I will help you find Sloane, you have my word. Now take the handcuffs off."

"I'm a desperate man, Sark, not a stupid one."

Sark produced a dramatic sigh. "You've told me again and again not to toy with you, Agent Bristow. And I won't. But if you tie my hands," Sark's mouth twitched at his own joke, "you do limit my ability to help you."

"We've identified three planes which took off from Mexico City on Sloane's orders: one to Lima, one to Hong Kong and one to Athens. He wasn't on any of them. Why?"

In reply, Sark rattled his handcuffs.

"What does Sloane want, Sark?"

Jack didn't expect Sark to answer. "For a madman, Sloane is relatively easy to predict. Why does he do anything?"

I think Sloane rather frightened Sark a few times in S2. Sark has his own reasons for wanting Sloane out of the picture.

"Rambaldi." The word was like a curse. "Do you believe that Sloane is insane?"

Sark was staring absently at the road ahead of them, his eyebrows raised. "I certainly hope so, Agent Bristow. Because the alternative--that Sloane knows exactly what he's doing--is extremely disturbing."

The alternative is unthinkable! (Sorry. I couldn't resist.)

Slightly surprised to find himself in agreement with his prisoner, Jack began to drive a little faster.

* * *

Sark shook his head when they arrived at the airfield. "No. Don't you understand? Sloane will never let the CIA get close to him."

"You aren't in a position to make decisions, Sark."

"If you aren't going to accept my advice, you might as well have left me in custody."

"Three planes. Which one do we follow?"

"Will you believe what I tell you?"

"You told us how to find him in Mexico City."

"Under duress, as I'm sure you recall." Jack raised an eyebrow just a fraction and saw what might have been amusement on Sark's face. "Point taken," Sark said.

I do like that exchange. They understand each other better than they'd like.

"It's possible that you enjoyed working for Sloane," Jack said. He watched Sark watch him as he reached into the back seat of the car and brought out a manila folder. "Turn around," Jack told him, and Sark twisted in his seat so that Jack could undo the handcuffs. When Sark turned back, flexing his uninjured hand carefully to get the blood flowing again, Jack handed him the folder. "This is the preliminary report on Allison Doren's death. You will see that none of her wounds were fatal: she bled to death. If Agent Vaughn is correct and Sloane was in Sydney's apartment, Allison was probably still alive when he left."

What I think happened is that Sydney healed Will, somehow, with an unconscious manifestation of Special Rambaldi Powers -- obviously, she wouldn't have healed Allison, but Sloane might at least have phoned an ambulance. Also, remember that Sydney shot Allison in the shoulders.

This is an interesting change of tone, for Jack -- but he needs something aside from the threat of the poison to keep Sark compliant, and that's what Allison is for.

Sark flipped the pages awkwardly with his left hand. Medical reports could be forged, as Jack knew all too well. Sark would know that too, would consider how convenient this report was for Jack. But the utter lack of expression on his face told Jack everything he needed to know. Sark closed the file, clutching it and then forcing his fingers to relax. "Athens. He's going to Athens." His voice was almost normal.

Of course, I suppose that claiming to have Allison in custody would be useful too, if Jack were going to forge something. But it's usually easier to work with the truth than with an elaborate set of lies.

This is the end of the first section. It's really a lot of setup, to introduce the characters and get them working together. Perhaps it's a bit dull, compared to the rest of the story, because not much happens, and neither character seems to undergo any kind of development. Over the next parts, Jack's opinion of Sark will start to change, and Irina will enter the picture as well. At this point I've just started to get into the parallels and the potential relationship between the two men.

I suppose that the big unanswered question in this story is Sark's parentage -- is he Irina's son? is he Jack's? I leave it unanswered because in the end I don't think it matters. He is who he is, and the same is true of Jack and Irina. At the end of the story, Sark wonders what it would change to know, one way or another, and I think the answer he comes to is that nothing would change. What he wants from Jack and even more from Irina is some relationship (approval? devotion?) to the man he is now, not the child he probably never was. What would it change, if jack learned that Sark was his son? He would never hold the place in Jack's heart that Sydney does. For someone who has spent his life working on and around Rambaldi's legacy, Sark has a surprisingly shallow faith in the importance of genetics.


I was going to do part 2 as well, but this has taken days, what with one thing and another.

Comments

[kerlin.livejournal.com]

Fascinating. "Airs, Waters, Places" is probably my favorite Alias gen/adventure fic. You manage to show so much of the complexity of what is really a classic Alias situation - keep your friends close and your enemies closer. Sark has always been my blind spot in watching and enjoying Alias, and I always appreciate reading how smart people think of him. Thank you so much for this.

[vaznetti]

Thank you so much for suggesting it -- I really loved getting the chance to re-read it and think about it a bit. I'm just sorry it took so long to finish!

Sark has always been my blind spot in watching and enjoying Alias, and I always appreciate reading how smart people think of him.

This is how I feel about Vaughn. In this case, it was fairly simple to keep some distance -- I might adore Sark, but Jack certainly doesn't.