Fool Me (002, March)
Title / Prompt: Fool Me (002, March)
Character: Jack Bristow
Warnings: Spoilers through season 4
Pairings: Jack/Irina
Fandom: Alias
Word count: 459
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Alias belongs to me Wait, what do you mean it doesn't? Oh, alright. Alias and Jack belong to J.J. Abrams, Bad Robot, and ABC, even though they clearly don't love either of them as much as I do.
Jack Bristow used to wonder, after she came back into his life, how many more times the woman he loved would lie and betray him, before he'd seen enough to see the next one coming.
He used to think that he knew her motives, her strategies. Used to think that he knew every weakness, every tell. He used to think that if she ever meant to betray him again, he'd see it coming.
Mostly he hasn't.
He didn't see it coming in Panama. He never saw her walk away, only the tracer on his screen. But he's seen that moment a thousand times in his mind, and he knew the moment he'd lost her, the moment when the tracer vanished, and he knew she was never coming back.
It took a long time for him to forgive her for that- Sometimes he wonders if he ever would have, if not for Sydney's murder. (That she had been alive all along was another of those little ironies that have come to define his life; one of a million secrets he would someday learn at last.)
His grief at Sydney's death was the only thing that could have eclipsed Jack's fury for the manner in which Irina had left him. He was still terribly angry when they met again at last, but she had resources he didn't, and Jack had known he'd never find the truth without her. She was the only one he knew would be as dedicated to finding Sydney's killers as he was. The only other who would keep looking no matter how long it took, who would never stop looking.
Contacting her, he'd said that he needed her help. The truth was, he simply needed her, and they both knew it. She never admitted aloud to needing him, though she had allowed that she had missed him. He smiled at that, hearing clearly what she hadn't said.
When he went to meet her in Vienna, he wondered how that understanding had come to this.
For thirty years they had shared an understanding so deep it bordered on the subconscious. How, then, could he have failed to see the truth? How could he have never suspected, never known that it would come to this? Jack had loved her, grieved for her when he believed that he had killed her, but he had never hesitated- not much, anyway.
Sorry as he'd been, he had seen no other way.
And it had been so easy to slip into those old habits again, believing only the worst of her. Believing that she was capable of anything.
She has every right to hate him. Sometimes he is still surprised that she doesn't.
Thirty years, and sometimes he doesn't know her at all.
Character: Jack Bristow
Warnings: Spoilers through season 4
Pairings: Jack/Irina
Fandom: Alias
Word count: 459
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Alias belongs to me Wait, what do you mean it doesn't? Oh, alright. Alias and Jack belong to J.J. Abrams, Bad Robot, and ABC, even though they clearly don't love either of them as much as I do.
Jack Bristow used to wonder, after she came back into his life, how many more times the woman he loved would lie and betray him, before he'd seen enough to see the next one coming.
He used to think that he knew her motives, her strategies. Used to think that he knew every weakness, every tell. He used to think that if she ever meant to betray him again, he'd see it coming.
Mostly he hasn't.
He didn't see it coming in Panama. He never saw her walk away, only the tracer on his screen. But he's seen that moment a thousand times in his mind, and he knew the moment he'd lost her, the moment when the tracer vanished, and he knew she was never coming back.
It took a long time for him to forgive her for that- Sometimes he wonders if he ever would have, if not for Sydney's murder. (That she had been alive all along was another of those little ironies that have come to define his life; one of a million secrets he would someday learn at last.)
His grief at Sydney's death was the only thing that could have eclipsed Jack's fury for the manner in which Irina had left him. He was still terribly angry when they met again at last, but she had resources he didn't, and Jack had known he'd never find the truth without her. She was the only one he knew would be as dedicated to finding Sydney's killers as he was. The only other who would keep looking no matter how long it took, who would never stop looking.
Contacting her, he'd said that he needed her help. The truth was, he simply needed her, and they both knew it. She never admitted aloud to needing him, though she had allowed that she had missed him. He smiled at that, hearing clearly what she hadn't said.
When he went to meet her in Vienna, he wondered how that understanding had come to this.
For thirty years they had shared an understanding so deep it bordered on the subconscious. How, then, could he have failed to see the truth? How could he have never suspected, never known that it would come to this? Jack had loved her, grieved for her when he believed that he had killed her, but he had never hesitated- not much, anyway.
Sorry as he'd been, he had seen no other way.
And it had been so easy to slip into those old habits again, believing only the worst of her. Believing that she was capable of anything.
She has every right to hate him. Sometimes he is still surprised that she doesn't.
Thirty years, and sometimes he doesn't know her at all.