There are four ways to reach Michael Vaughn. The first three — home phone, work phone, and pager — are far less reliable, used only by those that don't know of the fourth, or don't require its immediacy.

The fourth, his cell phone, has been a permanent appendage since he joined the CIA — even more so since he became a handler. Important enough that it is a priority when purchasing clothes — suitable pockets a necessity. Important enough that there are extra batteries located at various stopping points in his life — desk drawer, glove box, kitchen counter.

In seven years, its has never been more than a few feet away from him, and today is no exception. The answering service is set to come on at 50 or so rings — he hasn't checked the exact number, but knows it is preposterous, designed to never be needed. One beer-filled night, Weiss suggested he change the default message: "Hi, this is Michael. If you're listening to this message, I'm either completely fucking unconscious or dead."

He is neither, but he is also not the first one to wake when it rings at 4:55 after another beer-filled night. This person is Watkins, sprawled mostly across his stomach, where she passed out shortly after they finished. Eyes snapping open and body tense at the first ring, she gives him two before speaking, hand firm around his shoulder.

"Answer your damn phone, or I'll answer it for you."

He wakes with this, and absorbs surroundings drowsily. His back itches from the carpet, stomach feels the weight of her begin to lift. Her hair sweeps from his chest as she rolls away with a groan, starts to stand and caves at the middle. He rises quickly with this, wraps an arm around her waist and supports her to standing.

They stumble the few feet to the couch together, and she flops into it stiffly. Vaughn waits for a few seconds, watches her pull down the mismatched plaid blanket draped over the back and wrap herself in it. When her eyes close and the grimace leaves her face, he moves toward the sound of the still-ringing phone.

And so it takes fifteen rings for Michael Vaughn to answer his cell phone. Given the circumstances, he considers this pretty good. Only a limited number of people have the number in the first place, and at this hour of the morning, he considers only two scenarios. The first is a mushroom cloud somewhere, but given the silence of Watkins's phone, one of his agents is far more likely.

"Hello?"

"Oh." The caller is Sydney, which he has also assumed, because SD-6 would have to be in flames for Dixon to want to meet at this time. "I'm sorry. I must have the wrong number. Sorry to bother you."

It is only a couple-second fake wrong number, her voice through the receiver. But Vaughn still feels strange as he hits the end button. He lays this on the fact that his clothes are still strewn across the floor. They are collected quietly before a quick trip to the bathroom, where he splashes cold water on his face, runs a little through his hair, and tries not to think about the implications of reality.

He wants more time to linger, to think, to search the medicine cabinet and find out what pain medication she takes. Instead, he dresses quickly, this late-night action familiar, although the locale isn't. The light from the bathroom shines off her eyes, quiet on the couch, as he steps out.

"Everything okay?"

"I don't know yet."

"Take my gun or my car, preferably both. I don't want to be responsible for you getting your ass shot off."

He crosses the room, collects his wallet and her gun. "Are you going to be okay? You need anything?"

"Nah. I'm just gonna sleep it off here." She pulls the blanket a little tighter and closes her eyes, which he takes as a cue to leave.

He picks up her keys and purse by the door, roots through the latter to find the clip. His hand is on the doorknob when he notices the cane, leaning against the wall. Steps soft over the linoleum and then the carpet, he moves it, propping it against the arm of the couch.

Her voice reaches him as he turns back toward the door.

"Michael, you're right. This is absurd."

He does not ask which this she is referring to.

———

The night is even cooler as he steps out of the side of the building. The parking lot here is fenced, and well-lit, which somehow manages to be enough on most nights. He walks across the disintegrating asphalt and considers the keychain in his hand. The keys have not changed much, and he assumes — correctly, it turns out — that their matches are still the same.

Her car is a black Mazda Miata, apparently fresh out of storage, still suffering from the grocery cart ding on the driver's side that turned her ballistic. Too flashy for protocol, but she said it made for a better cover: "Nobody who drives a car like this works for the CIA."

That settles a little uncomfortably on his mind, and it takes him awhile to realize why. Sydney is going to see you pull up in this. The fact that he is wearing the same, more-wrinkled clothes as their previous meeting can — hopefully without stammering — be explained as falling asleep on the couch. Couch, floor, Chris. Same difference. He can't think of a way to explain away the very obviously not-his car, and considers stopping to swap it for his, but he is already running late — starting farther from the warehouse than usual.

He wonders — not for the first time — if maybe Chris is right as he glides through the night, a tiny black blur. The car, the clothes, the time more appropriate to an executive sneaking home to his wife after a night with the mistress, and some of this is how he feels. Through five gears quickly on the highway, not sure if a cop would believe his CIA credentials, the gun tucked beneath his belt, if he happens to chance upon radar. He doesn't, and makes good time. Beats Sydney there, which won't help the car predicament. Screw it. There are a million reasons why you could be driving this, and only one centers around what really happened.

He enters carefully, the door still ringing slightly into the night as he closes it, one hand pressed against the metal to muffle noise. The first switch provides enough light to find one of the wobbly wooden tables at the front of the cavernous place. He hoists himself to sitting on one and waits.

Sydney walks in a few minutes later, hair pulled into a sloppy ponytail, clad in sweatpants and a tank top. Traveling clothes, and he realizes she must be on her way to the airport. Her face looks only slightly flustered, but her pace is quick.

"What's going on?" A preemptive strike, perhaps too abrupt. Although she'd better have something more important to discuss than my choice in transportation.

She seems a little startled by this, and leans against the table across from him. Waits awhile before speaking, which, he learns, is because it is the same old tense topic.

"It's Will. I think he's getting worse, and with me having to leave again, I'm just...worried about him."

"Sydney, we've talked about this. The Agency has counseling — "

" — and I told you he doesn't want therapy." She crosses her arms, waits for him to spin this around in the familiar circle.

"There's a difference between what he wants and what he needs, Syd. You can be his — " Friend? Yes, friend. " — friend all you want, and I'm sure that helps, but he needs a professional."

"He won't go see anyone, Vaughn. I've tried convincing him — I don't even know how many times. There has to be something else you can do."

Please don't tell me you called me out here so we can have this damn argument again at 5:30 in the morning. "Sydney, if you want help for him, I can get it. But that's all I have to offer. You need to tell me what it is you want me to do."

"I don't know what I want you to do. That's the whole problem, Vaughn." And I don't have a solution, Syd. I've never had a solution. She fusses at the lumps around her ponytail holder. "Anyway, I'm sorry I called you out here."

Her voice turns bitter at the end, and this pinches a little. "Sydney, I told you that you could call me any time." And up until tonight, that was a hundred percent true. You would have thrown on some clothes, hopped into your normal CIA car and driven here without a second thought.

Sydney is silent for a moment, her eyes tracing him. "Are you okay? I mean, I know it's probably not any of my business, but the car, and you look..." She trails here, because there is no way to describe him that meshes with their current tension.

"The car's on loan." Don't dig too far, Sydney, unless you want to know the fucked-up truth. "And I'm fine, but thanks for asking."

"Oh." Quite adept at cramming emotion into that little word. This time, a bit taken aback, and she does not dig any further.

"Sydney, you know I'm here whenever you want to talk." This sounds more sincere, feels more sincere, and he is glad to get it right for once. "But we need to stop having this conversation. I want you to talk to Will, do whatever it takes. I'm going to have a cab waiting at the corner of Alameda and First — 9:30 Monday morning. We'll get Will scheduled with someone, and go from there."

"Okay." Soft, then she stares into him again, and he thinks maybe she knows.

"He will get better, Syd. But you have to let us help him."

"Yeah." Her hands push off of the table and she starts toward the door.

"Is, ah, everything still okay with the mission?"

She turns, eyes smoking brown in the dim light. "It's fine. Thanks, Vaughn."

"Well, then, good luck."

Maybe, he thinks, as he slides from the table to follow her, the conversation went better this time because he feels substantially more neutral on the topic of Will Tippin.

———

Intentionally or not — intentionally, he suspects, because it would not be beyond her — Watkins has removed some of the absurdity from the situation. There are the things — her car, her gun — which must be returned. There is his suit jacket, accidentally left draped over the couch. There is the cane next to it. There is the pain.

And so there is no opportunity to slink off, to chalk it up to a fuck-tomorrow mistake, marked by awkward glances in chaotic hallways. Instead, he will go back, and they will attempt a normal morning after. Which is not ideal, but preferable to slinking, he thinks.

The cane is no longer leaning against the couch when he returns, and a closer inspection finds her missing as well. He starts down the short hallway to her bedroom, wonders briefly how her trip down this path went.

The bedroom door is still white-painted wood, a bit more scuffed than before, and he opens it slowly, listening for the creak. Too much of that, he knows, and the extra Glock on her nightstand will be pointed at him.

The door finally open, he leans against the frame. She has put on a nightgown — red satin, brown hair and pale skin against the white sheets. Calm sleep, a contrast to the newer lines on her face, the ones absent from the last time he walked into this scene. And now he works through other options, namely the couch. Geography, in these hours, is a statement.

Instinct draws him to the bed. To curl up beside her in a time before Sydney.

That name gives him pause. Sydney. He owes her nothing. Nothing since she initiated the stranger's distance. Nothing after he placed emotions out there, so painfully transparent, and watched her walk through that mist, oblivious. He was never in love with her, but there was a time when he allowed himself — foolishly — to consider the possibility. It is enough for a pause, a permanent reflex action.

Settling, perhaps, for less than a standard. Unless waiting for the standard is settling.

He is slow with the buttons on the shirt, dragging his fingers on them. Dragging out the decision, although he knows the answer will be instinct. Shirt, then pants, hands deliberate as he folds them, places them on her dresser.

His fingers curl around the edge of the sheets, and it is now that he ponders the real point of no return. Traces it back, past the sex, past the kiss, past the bar. Maybe this has all been inevitable since he saw her, post-metamorphosis.

She is warm against his chest, beneath his hand, placed carefully above the painful place. One deep breath draws in the familiarity of her hair — mint around his nose, against her neck.

Something, there with him. A lot more than something. It is a welcome change.