Just one more try
By Arianna (aka wavBec)

"How about a quick weekend getaway before we have to face Dr. Klaus?" Julian asked, his finger tracing the shape of the top button on the green silk pyjama top she'd borrowed. They were both stalling getting out of bed this sunny morning.

"Do we really have to face her?" Arianna groaned.

"Well, if we want to keep working together, yes."

"It's morning, can I have a little more of an explanation?" She stretched and rolled over, resting one arm and her chin on top of his chest.

"She suspended me the other night, when we thought you'd been killed in the accident. Until I agree to one of her 'complete psychological evaluations', technically I'm not a liaison anymore. And after your kidnapping, you can count on spending some time with her as well." He saw the concern in her eyes and lightly rubbed the back of his fingers against her cheek. "Don't worry, you can handle her."

"Where shall we go?"

"Canada, there's an old friend and his wife in Quebec I'd like to visit, we could fly up for the weekend, perhaps do some shopping, and then deal with Klaus when we get back."

* * *

Julian went to his study to make their travel arrangements while she made a pot of tea with shaking hands. She wasn't so much worried about seeing the company psychiatrist herself, but she worried about him. What if Dr. Klaus erased even more of his memory? Or ordered they be re-assigned? The doctor disapproved of liaisons and contacts getting too close. They'd avoided her thus far, but now it looked like they had no choice if they wanted to go back to work.

She dropped slices of bread into the toaster and started searching the cabinet for the honey. As she was straining on tiptoe to reach the bear-shaped plastic bottle, he came up behind her and kissed the side of her neck, easily retreiving the jar from it's place on the top shelf.

"We're all booked on the 2pm flight this afternoon, and we'll have dessert and coffee at the deanery tonight."

"The deanery?" she asked.

"You'll see."

After a quick breakfast, they packed their bags for the weekend and once again left for the airport. Quebec was just a three hour flight, barely a hop compared with the recent trips to England and Thailand. By dinnertime, they were checked into a luxurious suite at the Chateau Frontenac.

Over dinner in the hotel restaurant, Julian told her what he remembered about the old walled city, and afterward they drove to the house next to a small Anglican chapel where he introduced her to Father Dominicus and his wife Helga. They were a very jovial couple that immediately made Arianna feel like a long lost member of the family. She guessed both were probably in their mid to late 60's, and from Helga's accent, imagined they'd emmigrated from somewhere in Germany, or perhaps Bohemia. The four of them enjoyed tea and cakes, chatting for nearly an hour before Dom took Julian into his private office for some business, leaving Arianna and Helga alone.

* * *

"Jacob and I have kept in touch through the years," the older man smiled as they sat at opposite sides of a large mahogany desk. "He recently mentioned you had a new partner that was good for you, but you were such an intense and brooding child, I never thought we'd ever see you so at peace with anyone."

"Is it really that obvious?" Julian asked with a sheepish grin.

"No, only to the few of us you've ever let close enough to know you." Julian mentally counted names, Dom, Helga, Jacob, Dawson, and of course Ari. Only four outsiders that would notice he'd changed, he supposed he could live with that.

"Please don't let anyone know I've been here, we still have a couple of problems to iron out with our employers at present."

"Don't worry, I remember all too well how things work with them. Now, what is it you want me to try to arrange for you?"

* * *

"It is good to see him again, after all zees years." Helga poured another cup of tea for each of them.

Arianna had guessed from the conversation that they were friends from long ago, perhaps his school years and shyly asked, "Helga, can you tell me how long you've know Julian?"

"Oh, it vas many years ago, I remember him as very qviet child. Ve had small house across park from zee school. Dom vould bring him home for dinner on veekends, zey vould make jigsaws on my dining table late into zee night, sometimes talking, sometimes in qviet. I tink he vas very homesick, and he missed his animals. Ve had vhite cat and Alsation at zee time. He vould play ball vith zee dog before dinner and after, zee cat vould settle on his lap for hours vhile zey make puzzles. It vas sad to see one so young be sad. It's good to see him happy now, I am glad you haf found each ozer my dear."

Arianna blushed slightly and was going to ask Helga if it was really that obvious but just then Julian and Father Dominicus returned to the sitting room with a puzzle box. "Ah, see after all zees years, boys get bigger but zey never change," she laughed.

While Helga worked on her needlepoint, the three others went to sit around the dark walnut table in the dining room. With six hands at work, turning out and sorting the 1000 pieces went very quickly and soon each was busily assembling a different area of an Alpine landscape. It was after 10pm when the last piece was put in place and by the time they said goodnight, Arianna felt as though she'd known them both for a long time, rather than just a few hours.

* * *

"What are you thinking?" he asked as they snuggled together in the large bed. The full moon shining in through the open curtains cast streaks of cool white light across the room.

"I thought you could tell without asking," she teased.

"Well, I can, but I try not to. Sometimes it just seems.... rude, to read your thoughts without asking. You asked me first about the nightmares in London, I wanted to be as considerate."

"Tonight was fun, they're wonderful people, I was wondering how you met them."

He sighed, "I wanted to go to Eton, but instead was sent to Cabal school here in Quebec. Dominicus was school chaplain at the time. We used to call him Father Dom. He and Jacob were the only ones that seemed to make any impression on a troubled 12 year old, a long way from home. They were the only friends I had. Back then, I couldn't understand why I'd been separated from my family, and everything I knew as home. Sometimes, it still doesn't make any sense."

Arianna remembered the entries in the locked file XC-1 about his grandfather and father working for conflicting agencies and tried to push the memory away before he sensed it, but it was too late, she could see from the surprised look in his eyes that he already knew.

"You got into the locked file, didn't you?"

"I can't lie to you Julian. I read it the night after we got back from Bangkok. It was..... disturbing. Would you trust me if I said you'll be happier not remembering that lost year?"

He looked into her eyes for a moment and said, "You are the 'only' one I trust." After kissing her warmly he let the conversation drop, but she wondered if he might not try to find out what she knew of the file while they slept.

* * *

He'd made a promise to himself that he would not invade her thoughts without asking first and he always kept his word, but the temptation was very strong. Laying there, watching the moonlight track it's path across the room and unsuccessfully trying to get to sleep, he kept wondering what it was that she didn't want him to remember. She'd been peacefully curled against his side for quite some time before she quietly whispered, "There are a few parts of the file you should know." He'd thought she was asleep, but now rolled onto his side with his head resting on his elbow, facing her.

"Jacob mentioned a rift in your family after your father was killed. The file confirmed that your mother's father was with the Cabal. Your father was part of the Committee, some sort of rival agency. There was a name, Abernathy, it said that he turned against you on the last assignment of your missing year." In the moonlight she could see his forehead wrinkle into a puzzled scowl as he ran his hand through his hair.

"That makes sense of some of the arguments I remember overhearing as a child. My father was much closer to my brother and I always favoured my grandfather. The two of them always seemed at odds with each other but I never understood why. Abernathy apprenticed with Grandfather, but they had some sort of falling out, and he went away. Father mentioned him on occasion, but I didn't see him again until I was 'loaned out' to the Committee for an assignment, he was my Keeper for those years."

"The details of your last assignment were a bit scattered, it was mostly conjecture from Dr. Klaus."

"What did she say?" he asked suspiciously.

Arianna sat up and sighed, not really wanting to tell him. "The end of the report said you remembered something about a gunfight near a bridge. You were found half drowned, wearing a badly damaged bullet-proof vest and your car was left on the bridge. Dr. Klaus surmised you'd tried to kill yourself, but I don't believe that conclusion for a minute."

"She's an idiot, I'd never take that way out, it's too unreliable," he snapped, getting out of bed and pacing the floor.

"Julian, don't talk like that, you're scaring me." When he saw the concern and panic in her eyes, he came back to the bed and put his arm around her shoulders.

"I'm sorry, it's just that after finding my brother's body drowned as a child, jumping off a bridge is one thing I'd never deliberately try, expecially in a Kevlar vest."

"Please don't even joke about 'taking a way out', reliable or not," she choked, wrapping both arms around his chest.

"Ssssh, it's alright. Don't worry, I won't."

"The report said she dismissed a bruise on your chest as being from hitting the water from a great height." His fingers went to a spot just over his heart. "I can understand now why you feel the way you do about her, but I think she was trying to do what she thought was best at the time."

"What she thought was best erased almost a year of my life, I'll never forgive her for that." There was a tense bitterness in his voice that she'd not heard often, but she thought she finally understood his hatred of Dr. Klaus.

They both lay quietly for a long while before she felt him start to calm down. "Neither will I," she whispered and closed her eyes.

* * *

Once she was asleep, Julian carefully got up and went out to the living room of their suite. The moonlight coming in through the balcony windows lit the room more than enough to find his way around the furniture. He was tired, but wanted just one more try at probing the depths of his mind for some hints of the missing year. The few clues she'd revealed from the locked report were not much help, but he did remember having a tender spot in the center of his chest for quite some time after a short stay at a 'training center' he'd been sent to a few years ago. He knew she'd share his nightmare if they were close, so he decided to sleep on the sofa. Stretching out on the couch, he wrapped up in the blue cashmere throw and lay back against the pillows to try and concentrate.

Julian woke suddenly with one name ringing in his ears ........ Cassandra. After several gasps for air, he sat up and rubbed both hands through his hair, trying to make some sense of it all. Each time something came back to him, it was like one finding one more piece of a jigsaw puzzle where you don't know what the completed picture should be. Sifting back through the details that he could remember, he slowly got up and poured a drink from the suite's well stocked liquor cabinet. Draining the glass in one gulp, he sighed as the amber liquid burned through him, leaving behind a soothing, steadying warmth.

When he returned to the sofa with the crystal decanteur and the glass, a few of the pieces started coming together. Cass had turned up as a new operative just after his first 'on loan' assignment with the Committee. They'd worked together on Cabal assignments, or so he'd thought, until she disappeared in 1994. The very next year had been wiped from his memory. Suddenly, the thought of her as a Committee member explained some of the loose ends that had been nagging him since the encounter at the warehouse in Bangkok.

Refilling his drink, he had to admit Arianna was right, he'd have been happier not remembering, but in another way, he felt a small bit relieved, at least now he could dispute Dr. Klaus' conjecture of that had actually happened at the bridge.

* * *

Arianna woke with a sudden jolt, thinking she'd heard him call her name, but his side of the bed was empty, "Julian?" she said softly, squinting to see in the moonlight.

*I'm here* she heard him clearly in her mind, but unlike the first time he'd tried, it didn't make her dizzy.

*Where?* she thought back.

*The living room*

The luminous hands on her watch indicated it was only 2am, as she thought to herself 'why would he be up at this hour?' she went out to find him sitting on the couch. He was leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and his head held in both hands.

"Julian, what have you done?" she asked worriedly, kneeling on the cushions beside him and placing her hands on his shoulders. As soon as she touched him, she could sense much of what he'd just seen.

"Remembered something, I think," he said softly. "The bridge, I saw what really happened. It was Cassandra. She fired at close range and I fell into the water."

"So was she really working for the Committee the whole time?" Feeling the tension built up in him, she started to gently massage his shoulders.

"It's possible," he sighed.

"And Klaus was wrong."

"Yes." He closed his eyes and let his head fall back against her arms as her hands rubbed the sides of his neck, then murmered, "That feels wonderful."

"Why did you come out here?"

"Didn't want to drag you in with me, if it worked," he said quietly.

*I want to be with you if you remember anything else, you might need a witness to dispute Dr. Klaus* she thought.

*She doesn't believe in telepathy, thinks it's all a trick. Communicating this way doesn't bother you any longer?*

Arianna shook her head once, "There's just a slight tingle, like the beginnings of a headache, but not the dizzyness there was the first time."

"Your skills are improving all the time, we'll need to experiment and see what range of distance works, " he yawned, finally starting to relax.

She stood up and took his hands in hers, pulling him toward the other room. "Another time professor, for now you need sleep, come back to bed."

* * *

They were woken by the incessant ringing of a cell-phone early the next morning. "It must be yours, I left mine at home." Julian muttered, drawing the covers up over his head.

*Damn* she thought.

"I heard that," he teased as she hurried to the other room to find the phone at the bottom of her purse. A short time later she came back to the bed and nudged him awake. "You'd better get up, we have an assignment."

"I beg your pardon?" He folded back the covers and rubbed his sleepy eyes.

"It was Gervase Blue, we've been summoned to Vermont, immediately."

"But I'm on suspension," he protested.

"Well, either Big Blue doesn't know it, or doesn't care, we're to meet with the rest of the team this afternoon."

"Just who exactly is the rest of the team?" he asked.

"When I asked him that, he just laughed and said we'd find out when we got there."

Next Chapter: Into the Lion's Den

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